


The Drabbley Adventures of Deon and his Dads

by Assassin_J



Series: protoparents' creed [2]
Category: Assassin's Creed, [PROTOTYPE]
Genre: A-spec Alex Mercer, Ace spectrum character, Autistic Character, Canon-Typical Violence, Dad Alex, Daddy Desmond, Established Almond, Fluff and Smut, Kidfic, M/M, Married Life, Mostly fluff though, Post-Mpreg, Sequel, Some Plot, bits of drama, content ranges by chapter from completely G-rated to explicit, good-natured bickering, inFAMOUS references, other video game references, slices of life
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-27
Updated: 2018-02-07
Packaged: 2018-05-23 11:56:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 26,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6115702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Assassin_J/pseuds/Assassin_J
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Li'l fluff scenes with Married!Almond and their half-virus kid. Also some smut occasionally. And a sort of vague plot sometimes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Look Out For Number One

"What **is** that?"

"Hm?"

Alex looked at Desmond incredulously. "You don't smell that?"

"Smell what?" Desmond sniffed a couple times, then looked over at the crib. "I don't smell anything, but your super-senses are probably picking up on him, I bet."

"Deon? Why would **Deon** smell like that?" Alex went over and picked up the less-than-day-old baby, staring quizzically. "It smells like he..." Recognition clicked suddenly. "Oh. He... he urinated."

"Babies do that," Desmond said, laughing.

Alex turned back to Desmond. "But I don't do that."

"He's not you. He's got human digestive stuff. Semi-human, at least." Desmond shrugged. "I'm betting maybe he was dehydrated, from spending all that time in you, Mr. Never-Touches-Water. So he drank a shitload of formula to compensate, and this is the result, ya know."

Alex looked baffled. "So, now what?"

"Well, uh, now we gotta change his diaper. Else he'll probably start to cry and stuff." Already, Deon was fidgeting, uncomfortable with the wetness.

"You do it." Alex hurriedly pushed the baby into Desmond's arms. "I don't know these things."

"You think I'm some diaper expert?"

"You have more experience with... bathroom matters."

Deon was whining and squalling now, and Desmond rolled his eyes with a benevolent sigh. "Fine, I'll change him, but you better fuckin' watch and learn. Next time it's your turn."


	2. do what married couples do

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whoops it turned into smut this chapter

Alex was splayed out shirtless on the bed, running his fingers over Desmond's fuzzy hair, enjoying the savory taste of his mouth. For the first time in weeks, they could take it slow and do lots of foreplay first, since Deon was right now being watched by Dana and Rebecca.

Trailing his fingers down Alex's lightly-furred abdomen, Desmond pulled away for a moment. "It's kinda weird, you not having the big ol' belly anymore."

Alex gave him a look of mild irritation. "That wasn't a standard part of my body, you know."

"Yeah, but I'd gotten really used to it. Like an acquired kink. Heh."

Alex chuckled as well. "Can't get it up for a flat tum anymore?"

"Aw, naah. You're still the fuckin' sexiest mofo I ever met. I'll manage." Desmond traced a circle around Alex's navel. "Are you still real sensitive there? Or was that just a pregnancy thing?"

Alex made a soft "mrrr" sound and arched upward into his palm.

"Wow, okay. Making a mental note now: belly rubs still awesome even without belly."

Alex chuckled again. "Not quite the same. Not as intense as before. But yes. Still awesome."

"Sounds like you acquired a kink of your own, huh?"

"Rrr. Stop talking so much and just rub."

Desmond obliged him with continued tender touches all over his torso.

After a while Alex grew hungry for more. "Kiss me, Des," he pleaded, extending the 's' sounds, hissing with want. "Use your mouth, ohh, your sweet mouth." Tendrils sprouted as he spoke, pulling Desmond against him.

Desmond let his lips be guided by the virus' desire, lapping and licking at Alex's chin and collarbone, neck and nipples, tasting the outline of every perfectly-molded faux muscle. Steadily he made his way downward until he was at Alex's waist. "Hey, I can use my mouth some more if you get rid of your shorts." He palmed the vague bulge underneath them.

Alex looked surprised. "You want to..."

"Give you head, yeah. Why not?"

"Two words: Blacklight. Virus."

"Just don't go off in my mouth," Desmond said with a shrug. "Unless you think I'll be so mind-blowing you'll lose control?" He smiled.

Alex's face melted into a similar smile. "Ohh Des." He hugged Desmond close for a second, nuzzling the top of his head, before letting him free. "Go ahead, then."

Desmond watched the shorts dissipate to reveal a throbbing cock. Usually, giving oral wasn't his favorite thing in the world. But tonight- for Alex- he positively _ached_ to do it. He licked the crown a few teasing times, drawing out jittery purrs from his husband, before dipping his head down in one fell swoop to swallow him whole.

"Ohh! Des!" Alex said again, louder this time, toes curling in a reflex he wouldn't have thought he possessed. "You are too good to me."

Desmond slipped his mouth off for just a moment. "No; you deserve it. So enjoy it."

"Enjoy," Alex echoed, laying his head back on the pillow and closing his eyes.

"Yeah. I'm doing this 'cause I love you." Desmond paused, tried to think of more words to express the deep and profound feelings swirling inside him, but decided the best way to show it for now was to get back to the blowjob.

So get back to it he did.


	3. Alex discovers a newfound ability

Deon wasn't usually much of a crybaby. Most of the time if he was unhappy, he'd squirm, and wiggle, and grab at things or people with his tendrils while making fussy little sounds, but it was rare he would actually **cry**.

Oh but when he did cry... he cried his li'l hybrid lungs out.

Desmond was convinced his eardrums were starting to take permanent damage from this current outburst, which was going on near twenty minutes now. "C'mon, guy, chill, please chill." He'd tried everything: food, changing, toys, rocking him back and forth; all to no avail. "Christ you are so **loud**. Do we have earplugs anywhere?" He stepped away from the crib and towards the bathroom to look for some, or at the very least cotton balls or similar to cram in his ears.

Much to his surprise, Alex was right there, leaning against the wall. He smirked. "Giving up, eh?"

"What the shit? When did you get back in?" Desmond sputtered.

"About five minutes ago," Alex said, casually, almost drawling. He pushed gently past Desmond, who was having a hard time thinking of a response, and leaned over the crib. "All right, seems Daddy can't figure out what your deal is, so I'll give it a shot now." He reached down and picked up Deon, who seemed to gravitate right into his arms. Alex grew a few more tendrils and wrapped them around to be sure his hold was secure.

Desmond smiled. Alex was always oh-so-protective of their little guy. Sometimes Desmond legitimately thought they should do a PR campaign, cover Manhattan with giant photos of this so-called "monster" cautiously cradling the baby he so obviously loved.

Now Alex was muttering to himself, the words nowhere near discernible underneath Deon's cries. But the cries were becoming quieter, actually, and within a minute or so, the baby was calm again.

"What the- How did you-" Desmond was at a complete loss for explaining Deon's sudden change in temperament. "Was he just crying 'cause he missed you, or what?"

"He's teething."

"Wait, hold up, teething? No way he's started growing teeth already?" Desmond tapped his watch cynically. "He's literally two months old to the day today."

Alex shrugged. "Accelerated development?"

"Okay, right, virus baby, fine. But now he's all better suddenly?"

"I... uh. Helped." Alex looked down at where his fingers were stroking Deon's face. "Chemically." Part of him sounded unsure, like maybe he shouldn't have.

"Chemically?" Desmond repeated. "Chemica- oh geez, Alex? You, like, secreted something through your skin into his skin?"

Alex looked up. "Just a smidge. I- I didn't think- not consciously- just... knew he was in pain. Our cells... communicated."

Desmond exhaled. "Wow, this is... Wow." He laughed, a short soft chortle. "You are chock full of surprises, huh?" He stepped closer and hugged the both of them.

"So it's all right?" Alex sounded still unsure. "I basically drugged our child."

"He had pain, you gave him painkillers." Desmond took a close look at Deon. "And now it looks to me like the pain's gone. So yeah, it's perfectly all right. I mean, I trust your anesthetic glands or whatever are tuned to only give him the proper dose for his age and stuff." He smiled. "Just next time, come help out faster instead of just watching, promise?"


	4. Wabbajack

"Wannah bunnah!"

"Huh?"

"Wannah bunnah!" Deon said again, leaning forward in his highchair, gesticulating at the fruit bowl in the center of the table.

"Oh. Heh," Alex chuckled. "Wrong, kid. It's 'I want a banana.'"

"Awatta tabana!"

"Still wrong," Alex said flatly. "I'll give you one if you say it right."

Deon rubbed one hand over his mouth, further garbling his speech as he made another attempt: "Wabbanatana."

Alex sighed, put down the magazine he'd been half-assedly reading and came over to squat beside the chair. "Listen: 'I want a banana.'"

"Ah baba nanda!" Deon demanded, and reached his hand toward the bowl again, but found he was nowhere near reaching the object of his desire. So he put out a tendril to close the gap.

Alex intercepted, grabbing the bowl away. This was a matter of principle now. "Say it. 'I want a banana.'"

Deon stretched his limbs up with a fretful "Da!" (which was the term he'd settled on about a month ago to address either one of his parents.)

Alex stretched his own arm to place the fruit bowl atop the fridge, but first plucked one single banana from the bunch. "Okay, forget whole sentences. How about just 'banana'?" He waggled it teasingly, just out of Deon's reach."I'll give you the banana. When you _say_ 'banana'."

"Babanna!"

"Banana." Alex demonstrated the word with clear and embellished mouth movements. "Ba. Na. Na."

"Ba-ba-na?"

Alex smirked and shook his head a little. "Close."

Deon frowned. "Ka-wose?"

"Stay on topic; we're doing 'banana' right now. Ba-na-na."

"Ba... nana?"

"Hah!" A bark of proud laughter exploded from Alex. "Yes! You got it! _Banana_!"

A smile broke over Deon's face. "Da! Ah banana!"

"Right, right, you've earned it now." Alex removed and casually consumed the peel before handing over the hard-won prize. "Here. Enjoy."

Deon nommed right into the middle of it, making an absolute mushy mess all over his face.

Meanwhile Desmond, who had stealthily caught most of the shenanigans on his phone, was forwarding the video to everyone in his Hephaestus contacts list.


	5. and I forgot it in another dream

"No biting. Hey. _Hey._ " Alex pulled his finger out of Deon's mouth and wagged it at him. "No _biting_."

"Maybe if you don't stick your fingers in his mouth he won't friggin' bite," Desmond offered.

"He likes to suck," Alex said laconically, replacing the finger.

Desmond didn't know how to respond to this.

"My fingers are a favorite object for his suckling instinct," Alex continued. "Which he apparently has even after transitioning to solid food," he added, quieter, rolling his eyes.

"Normal kids suck their thumbs. Not their dad's fingers."

Alex snorted out a soft laugh. "He's anything but normal."

Desmond laughed too. "Fine, I guess as long as he's not hurting you-"

Deon spat out Alex's finger to interject, "Da not hurt! Da birus!"

" **Vi** rus," Alex corrected. "You must've heard that word, what, five hundred times by now? And you still can't get it right?"

"Chill, hon, he's talking pretty dang well compared to most six-month-olds. Oh hey." Desmond snapped his fingers. "Dunno why that reminded me, but y'know we still haven't had a proper honeymoon? With a vacation and all?"

"...Yes, I know that."

"Well, maybe sometime soon might be a good time."

"Hm." Alex started bouncing Deon slowly on his knee, but didn't say anything further.

"I'm thinking Seattle."

"Seattle," Alex repeated.

Deon joined in. "See-attah!"

Desmond grinned. "That's right, Seattle. Space Needle, Crocodile Cafe, all the big tourist traps."

"Hitting tourist traps may not be the wisest choice, security-wise."

"No, it'll be cool, we'll be disguised and stuff. Plus we're not gonna be tryin' to bust down doors and get hold of P.O.E. and stuff. We'll just be two dudes and their kid. Y'know Seattle got ranked, like, the most gay-friendly city in the U.S.?"

Deon pointed to the fridge. "Da, I gonna milk."

"Gonna _drink_ milk, Deon." Alex reached tendrils over to the kitchen area and poured a cup. "Why d'you want a honeymoon vacation all the sudden?"

"It came to me in a dream."

"Dream. Okay." He replaced the milk in the fridge and brought the cup over, moving the tendril back slowly and carefully so it wouldn't spill.

"Tanks, Da!"

"Dream where we lived in Seattle," Desmond added.

"Just us two, or the whole Assassins gang?"

"Uh. Don' recall all the details, but I do recall you, me, and Deon. Except he was older. And named Delsin."

"Del...sin," Alex said slowly, rolling the name around in his mouth like an unfamiliar dish he didn't quite trust not to disagree with his stomach. "Riiiight."

"He had some kinda virusy powers too, in the dream."

"He has them _in real life_."

"Yeah, but... these were different." Desmond scratched his chin, trying to remember the details. "Like... he could see people's memories without consuming them. And he could suck up smoke and then shoot it at people."

"Smoke. What."

"Also pink lasers of death."

"What the _shit_ is 'pink lasers of death'."

Desmond threw his hands in the air. "It's exactly what it sounds like, okay! Also I think I remember him summoning angels or some other weird crap like that."

Alex's twitching face was a sight to behold. "Those are not 'virusy powers'," he said, sounding confused and slightly angry.

"Yeah, not exactly, but he also healed really fast, and had hella superhuman parkour moves, and did that airdash glidey thing, and got called a terro-" Desmond stopped himself, sighed, and sat down. "Okay, I think we're kinda getting off topic here. Point is, I wanna go to Seattle for a belated honeymoon, a'ight?"

"Just because of this dream."

"Well no, not _just_ because of it," Desmond said, tilting his head back and forth. "I kinda almost went there after running away from the Farm. But I went to New York instead. And now I'm kinda curious to see what it might'a been like."

"Hm." Alex looked up at the ceiling for a few seconds, then snapped his gaze back to Desmond. "Wait. Getting called a terrorist isn't a 'power'."

"Ughhh." Desmond facepalmed and got up. "Fine, hon, you nailed me there. I'mma go head downstairs to talk to people about setting up this trip."

"Ba-bye Dada!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello yes i am becoming infamous trash now
> 
> it's all thanks to andromedapanda :3
> 
> also I swear I thought the chapter title was a titan a.e. reference but nope it's not


	6. Con Los Abuelos (primera parte)

"Ay, que lindo ese chico!" Janet pinched Deon's cheek, provoking a giggle. "And I swear you are getting bigger every day!"

"That is how 'growing' works, generally," Alex said with a half-smile.

Desmond looked from Janet to William. "You sure you'll be okay watching him? He's a real handful sometimes."

Deon shook his head vigorously and held up both palms. "No, I two hands, Dada!"

Desmond snickered. "Okay, you're two handfuls. If not more."

"We parented you sixteen years, hon; I'm sure we can manage him for a few days," Janet said, smoothing back a stray bit of Deon's unruly hair.

"Deon and Desmond aren't quite equivalent, Jan," William said. "For obvious reasons."

"Well yes!" Janet retorted with a smile. "Deon's not going to run away cross-country from us!"

"We should hope not," Alex said as he set down Deon on the floor carefully (for the boy was still not 100% a master of standing). "Are you going to be good while we're in Texas?"

"Tessas," Deon echoed.

"Focus, kid. You gonna be good?"

"Be good, okay," he answered, nodding.

Desmond crouched down and tousled his hair. "S'gonna be the first time we're apart for more than a few hours, huh?"

Deon's eyes widened.

"I know, I know. You'll miss us, and we'll miss you. But you'll be fine, okay? You're a big boy now. Well, relatively big, compared to a couple months ago." Desmond cocked his head up to grin at Janet. "You're right, he **is** on some sorta growth spurt."

"Does he eat much?" William asked.

"He'll eat whatever you give 'im, just about. Like a frickin' food vacuum."

William glanced at Alex. "Suppose that makes sense, considering his origin."

Desmond stood back up. "Yeah, well, he's origined from me too, so unlike Alex, he does have to chew it up first. And go pee-poo after."

"Pee-poo, pee-poo!" Deon said cheerily.

William made a face of slight discomfort.

Desmond grinned again. "Yeah, by the way, that's his current favorite word, so uh, get used to hearing it a lot."

"Not technically a 'word'," Alex said. The pendulum clock on the wall chimed. "Des, we need to get going."

"Right, right," Desmond said. With a bit of a sigh and a misty eye, he took hold of Deon's hand. "You be good for Gramma and Grampa, kiddo?"

"We already asked him that," Alex said, "and he already said yes. Come on." He gently separated Desmond from Deon and guided him towards the door. Whispering, he added, "I know. It's hard."

"Bye Da! Bye Dada!" Deon tottered a couple steps forward, waving after them, then started to lose his balance. Luckily, his viral instinct shot a tendril out lightning-fast behind him to wrap around the closest support- William's thigh- and save him from falling completely.

William startled a little at the tendril's grab and made a "Gah" sound under his breath.

"Ohh, mira, he likes you, Bill!"

"Janet, I don't think the tendrils- Oh, fine, whatever."

Desmond stopped in the doorway and waved one last goodbye. "Right, we're off. Stay safe, guys!"

"You too, mijitos!"

They picked up their duffel bags and walked down the hall and outside a bit before Alex turned to Desmond.

"Wait. She used to call _you_ 'mijito' and  _me_ 'yerno'. When did _I_ become 'mijito' as well?"

Desmond shrugged and smiled into the afternoon sunlight. "Yo no sé, honey-bae."

Alex's nose wrinkled. "'Honey' is fine. 'Bae' is fine. But don't use them together; that's too much."

"Oh, all right." Desmond threw an arm around Alex's shoulders and pecked him on the cheek.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is really just a prelude to the next one


	7. Con Los Abuelos (segunda parte)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> NOW WITH FANART!! 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> with thanks to [Dani](http://theladyisapirate.tumblr.com/) for inspiration

"How does do, Gamma?"

"Hm?" Janet brushed some hair behind her ear and looked up from her reading.

"Special cookies." Deon held up one of the angular confections dusted with sugar. "How does do?"

"Oh, you mean how I get them shaped like our symbol?" She smiled and winked. "An Assassin never reveals their secret."

Deon's mouth went pouty. "I Assassin too, though!" (He pronounced it like "dough".)

"Aw, sí, pero you're a little young to help out with cooking. I'll tell you when you're older."

"How older?"

She shrugged. "I honestly can't say! You age very uniquely."

Deon grumbled (sounding very much like a higher-pitched version of Alex) and twisted his fingers in his hair.

"Ohh child, don't, your hands have cookie dust all over." Janet put her book down and came over to his highchair. "Actually your hair is a mess even without that!" She produced a brush from her pocket.

Deon froze up and whimpered "N-no..."

"But mira, it's all tangled and-"

"No brushums!"

"All right, all right, no brushums." She made a show of slowly putting the brush down on the table. "How about we do bathums instead?" (Desmond and Alex had found out, through careful trial and error, that the chemical makeup of Deon's body was far less water-reactive than Alex's.) "You haven't had a bath since the night your papis left, and they're already coming back tomorrow."

Deon considered this a moment, then shook his head.

"But don't you want to be nice and clean to meet them?"

"Wanna ea' more cookie." He reached out to the tray of baked Assassin symbols.

"Oh, I think you've had enough." She plucked the tray away and started wrapping it in clingfilm.

Deon's lip quivered. "But Gamma! Cookies so good!"

"Ah ah ah, I know they are, but we've got to stick to a balanced diet." She put the cookies up in a high cupboard and turned back around just in time to see Deon turn into a formless gray-pink mass slithering down his highchair to the floor. "Ay! ¿Qué haces ahora?"

The Deon-mass scooted across the floor towards her.

"En esa forma líquida you're not invisíble, child! So don't think you're getting past me to those cookies!"

The mass stopped, writhing in place.

"Now let's turn back into yourself, all right?" She pulled a chair over by the mass and sat down, smiling. "Órale, turn back to my sweet nietecito."

The mass dithered a moment, then pulled itself- _himself_ , that is- up from a puddle-y shape into a ball and rolled out into the hallway.

Janet got up and followed after. "I hope you're heading for the bathtub!"

She heard a wild shriek from the front door of their apartment and a millisecond later rounded the corner to see William, stricken with shock, in the entryway, and Deon (still spherical) now rocketing the opposite direction.

"Oh Bill! Was that you yelling?"

"I- wha- tha-" William sputtered wordlessly and pointed after Deon.

"You scared him, the poor dear!"

"What? 'Him'? Who?"

"That's Deon, obviously!"

William harrumphed. "Obvious to **you** , maybe. How was I suppos-"

"This isn't the time to argue!" Janet cut in, and ran after Deon, who'd rolled into the living room and was twitching on the couch, looking sort of like a mismatched throw pillow. "Deon, come on," she said gently, slowly, reaching a hand out toward the swirling goo. He pulled away and made a noise sort of like flatulence.

"Deon!" William barked. "Don't be rude!"

Janet frowned at her husband. "He might not have made that noise on purpose." Then she turned back to Deon. "Sweetie, I'm sorry if you're upset, but you cannot have any more cookies tonight."

" **That's** what this is about?"

"Bill! Let me handle it!" Janet glanced down at the floor and picked up the stuffed Rubella virus from where it'd been tossed the other day. "Ooh, mira! It's Ruby!" She waggled it at Deon, though she wasn't altogether sure he could see while in this form.

"Wuben," the blob burbled.

"Yes, of course, Ruben. Why don't you turn back so you can play with him?"

The toy was well-loved, and starting to get a bit worn out. But Deon didn't mind, apparently, because his head and arms sprouted up from the puddle of indistinct matter, and he took it gladly from Janet and hugged it close. "Wuben good. I like."

Janet smiled. "All right, now you're a bit calmer, huh?"

"Maybe. I dunno."

"Oh I think you are." Janet patted his hair. "Ruben looks like he's gotten a bit dirty, huh? How about you and him go take a ba-"

" **No bath!** " Deon shouted, snapping fully back to human shape. Before Janet could even think what to do next, he'd flung Ruben at her and dashed over the couch, down the hall, and out the door, chanting "No bath, no bath, no bath," all the way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well shit I guess this arc is gonna be a three-parter


	8. Con Los Abuelos (conclusión)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, thanks to [Dani](http://theladyisapirate.tumblr.com/) for inspiration!

_How in the world,_ William wondered, _can he run so fast, when he's barely able to stand still without falling over?_

He didn't have any breath to voice this question right now, though. Just keeping Deon in sight was exhausting. The kid was dashing through Central Park, practically a blur as he weaved around trees and hurdled boulders with seemingly no effort.

William glanced to his right to check that Janet hadn't fallen behind.

She was keeping pace pretty well. "¡Mijo! ¡Vuelve a la casa!" she yelled out to the speeding boy. "¡Ahora mismo, órale!"

Nothing doing: Deon continued to run, like he hadn't even heard her. The edge of the park was coming up soon, and a stab of fear hit William's heart as he saw a raging torrent of traffic straight ahead. "Deon! Stop!" he barked urgently.

Deon stopped and looked back for one brief moment... then jumped up, viral coils propelling him straight into a tree. Branches cracked and leaves flew through the air.

William followed him up as quickly as he could, but as soon as he'd reached the highest branch, he saw Deon leap again, surge over the street, and grab hold on a brick building. Dark armor sheathed his body as he started to climb even higher.

William dropped from the tree and hurried to cross the street himself, leapfrogging with loud _clunks_ on the tops of cars and then one final jump to the fire escape. As he and Janet trailed after Deon, ascending into the sky, he swore to himself that the boy's sugar intake would be strictly limited from now on.

_Or maybe we just shouldn't let ourselves get wrangled into babysitting anymore._

 

* * *

 

Upward they chased him, and then southward, then northward again, zigzagging all over the island, parkouring from skyscraper to skyscraper, for nigh on twenty minutes.

"Dios mío, este chico..." Janet wiped sweat from her brow as they took a quick breather in the shade under a billboard.

William was looking feverishly back and forth across the cityscape. "Where is he? Have we lost him?"

There was a moment of worried silence. Then Janet lifted her arm and pointed into the sky.

A drone was whirring across their field of vision. _Bweep! Bweep! Bweep!_ it went, orange lights flashing around its circumference.

"Oh, no." William's shoulders drooped, his head filling with vague visions of experimentation being done on the sweet hybrid child.

The drone rose higher and turned the corner of the building. Janet and William hurried to follow- no, to _beat_ it wherever it was headed.

 

* * *

 

They found him on a ledge near the top of the Empire State Building, fast asleep and unarmored. Finally, _finally_ , he'd worn himself out.

Janet bent down and scooped him into her arms. "Qué alivio. Now it's just a matter of getting him home safely."

No sooner had she said that, the drone swooshed up out of nowhere. But William was quick and seized hold of it, then swung it down to smash against the concrete at his feet.

This noise rustled Deon; he made a small sound and shifted to bury his face in Janet's neck, but did not wake.

Janet smiled. "Such a troublemaker he is."

"I'm too old for these type of shenanigans," William groaned, rubbing the small of his back.

"Oh, nonsense." Janet leaned over and kissed his cheek.

 

* * *

 

Once they were certain no more drones were incoming, they rappelled down to the ground and cautiously made their way back. Helicopters and more drones buzzed overhead from time to time, and at one point they passed a frantic soldier yelling to his underlings: "Look alive, men! We gotta find that damn virus! We gotta nip it in the bud before things get out of control again!"

But Deon remained fast asleep through all of it, even when a loudly worried group of Assassins met them at the den door.

William raised a hand. "Calm down, everyone; we've got him now; the situation is under control."

Dana shoved her way through the crowd to peer at Deon. "Is he all right? I heard Blackwatch radio chatter saying they were-"

"Chasing after him, yes," Janet said with a nod, "though they likely thought it was Alex they were chasing."

"Alex or another Runner, yeah. It's amazing they still don't know this guy exists." Dana patted Deon's head.

"Speaking of not knowing..." Janet gave William a meaningful look. "I think it's better if our mijitos don't know about his little excursion today, hm?"

William sighed and nodded agreement.

 

* * *

 

The Mileses were having a quiet supper when a knock came on their door. It was Desmond and Alex, home a bit ahead of schedule.

"Hey mamá, qué ambas?" Desmond said, flicking finger-guns and a smile at Janet when she opened the door.

Alex gave him a little shoulder bump. "Qué _ondas_."

"Oh, whatever."

Janet laughed. "You were close, mijito. Keep practicing."

"I've practiced a _ton_ over these past few days; now I just wanna relax a while." Desmond walked in and saw Deon asleep on the recliner. (He hadn't moved from when Janet plopped him down and draped a blanket over him.) "So how's he been?"

William coughed. "Getting much better at walking and _running_."

"Oh, cool, cool! Not too much trouble, then?"

Janet shrugged, a glint in her eye. "Oh, we had a little fuss when he didn't want to take a bath, but other than that? A perfect little angel."

"Good, good." Alex picked up Deon, who yawned and blinked at him. "Hey."

"Hey Dad," Deon mumbled, rubbing one eye.

"You have fun while we were gone?"

"Yuh-huh." He yawned again, wider. "M'tired. An' hungry."

So quietly no-one heard him, William muttered "Oh I wonder why."

 

* * *

 

While checking his email that night, Desmond received a new one from Rebecca.

Heya Des. Thought you might get a kic outa this pic. Its been goin ~viral~ all over (Shaun sez we should hack it out of existense bc of brohood secrecy, but rly it's p harmless lol)

Curiosity piqued, Desmond opened the attachment.

"Oh... woah."

The photo showed two senior citizens freeclimbing up the side of the Empire State. In block letters below, someone had added the caption "AGE IS JUST A NUMBER". It was a little out of focus, but nevertheless Desmond was pretty sure he recognized the unwitting stars of this meme.

He stared at it a little. Or a lot. Yeah... a lot.


	9. Enjoy Every Last Crumb

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _[May today be the best day so far, but the worst of what's to come](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ARBL51h8LI)_  
>         - George Hrab

"God, Deon; you gotta stop growing!" Desmond said as he struggled to try and fit the boy's shirt over his head and broad shoulders.

"I can't help it, though."

"But Alex froze himself looking 29," Desmond countered. "He doesn't grow or age."

"He's not me, though."

"Fine, fine," Desmond sighed and gave up on the shirt, stuffing it back in the drawer. "Guess I should be glad about that, heh. Be pretty weird if you stayed baby-sized forever."

"Yeah, be weird," Deon agreed with a vigorous nod. "I'm wanna get big and tall wike you!" The mispronunciation was a rare one; he was getting a lot better at speech these days.

"Got a ways to go before you're as big as me, kid," Desmond laughed. "Anyway, d'ya think maybe you could make your own clothes?"

"Wike Dad?"

"Yeah, like Dad. It'll save us time and money on buying you new sizes all the time."

"How I do it?"

"Well... uh." Desmond scratched his head. "Shit, I dunno. Like armor, but not?"

Deon's brow furrowed; he seemed to be concentrating, searching within himself. "Wike armor... but not..."

His skin shivered. Dark ripples started to appear, flowing along in coils and crescents, then counterflowing back with alterations of color. Low hissing emanated, and a few small tendrils flickered out at certain points as well.

Then suddenly, it all stopped. Desmond stepped back and blinked.

"This good?" Deon asked, lifting his arms.

"Oh my g- Is that-" Desmond walked around to look at the back. "Holy moly, it _is_. It's Alex's jacket."

Well, it was a childish mockup of Alex's jacket, the red dragon design not as sharply defined, looking almost like it was done in fat crayons. But it was hella impressive for a very first attempt. "Gosh..." Desmond finished circling and grinned at him. "That's really cool!"

"I'm weawy cool!"

"Yeah, you sure are!" Desmond picked him up two-handedly. "Ooof, you're really heavy too. Get on my back, let's do piggyback."

Deon obligingly slithered around and hooked his arms over Desmond's shoulders, and they headed out down the hall.

"By the time your next birthday rolls around, I might not be able to carry you at all," Desmond said. Some of the cheeriness had left his voice now. He often wondered if Deon's fast growth would continue unabated. The kid already looked three times his age; if this rate kept up he'd be hitting puberty in four or five years.

"Birtday!" Deon squawked, like he didn't even hear the rest of it. "Birtday means party! Food and fun!" He'd learned this concept just recently, from Desmond's 28th.

Desmond gave a weary smile. "Yeah, yeah. Let's go, then." They tromped down the stairs and entered the cafeteria to a slew of applause.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEON, read the red-frosted cake. And on the neighboring platter, the same icing message was repeated atop a slab of rare steak.

Deon's eyes went wide and his nostrils flared as the meat-scent hit his system. He jumped off Desmond and made a beeline for the steak, but was stopped by Alex with a strong tentacle and a stern "Open presents first."

Deon huffed unhappily, but obeyed, stepping over to the table full of colorful packages and picking out one at random. "It's heavy," he commented, shaking it a little.

"That's from Gramma Gracie," Desmond said.

"Gramma Gracie... Gramma Gracie," Deon repeated, methodically finding the spots where the paper was scotch-taped and peeling each bit away til the whole wrapping was loose enough to remove.

"You could just rip it," Alex said. "If you want. We won't mind."

Deon just hummed and kept peeling open the gift. It turned out to be a massive Play-Doh set, with fifteen colors of the stuff, plus an extruder and cookie cutters of various shapes.

"Ohh, we'll have fun with that, won't we?" Rebecca said.

William leaned over to peer at the label. "It says 'age three and up'."

Desmond made a squirrelly gesture with his hands. "Hey, you know he's more mature than the calendar says, so I think he'll be fine."

"Yes, I've been emailing Gracie recently about him," Janet said. "She's very interested in her bisnieto's development; she knows quite well he's not like other one-year-olds."

Deon stared at the colorful blobby letters on the package, a bit confused. "What is it?"

"It's Play-Doh," Desmond answered. "That's, uh... It's soft and mushy and you can make stuff outta it."

"Make stuff..."

"I'll show you how it works later." Desmond set the package aside and reached for another one, a simple green-striped paper bag. "Looks like this is from Shaun?"

Shaun nodded. "Yeah, and I know he'll love 'em." There was a little bit of snark in the words, and Desmond wasn't sure why.

Deon tore the bag open and a handful of rubber thingamabobs spilled out across the table: in various colors and with differing designs and texture.

"Right, now you have your own stim things and you can stop messing with mine," Shaun said, crossing his arms. "And hopefully the max-durability chewies are tough enough to withstand your mighty maw."

"Awesome!" Deon said around a nobbley red log he'd already grabbed and stuck in his mouth.

The present from Rebecca was a plush squid toy, nearly three feet long from tip to tentacle, and deep magenta. "Squid for the squiddy!" Rebecca said with a manic grin as she pinched Deon's cheek.

Deon squealed in delight and wrapped the toy tentacles around her face.

"Oh, it's got me!" Rebecca waved her hands above her head. "Somebody help!"

They goofed around with the squid for a bit before William gently reminded them there were still presents waiting.

Dana just then took notice of Deon's new jacket. "Hey, looks like someone gave ya a bonus present there before the party even started."

"No, I made!" Deon declared proudly, and looked toward Alex for approval.

Alex gave it with a smile and a nod. "I noticed."

"On his way to becoming a master of disguise," William said, a twinkle in his eye. "I'll have to be sure I don't accidentally send him out on a mission instead of you."

William's present was a colorful set of wooden tiles. Each one had a letter on one side and an illustrated word on the other. Deon picked one up and looked to William. "What does do?"

"What they do is teach you how letters make words," William said patiently, sitting down across from the boy. "See here, it's a star, because _S_ is for star."

Desmond pulled Alex over to whisper in his ear. "You think if he ate a book he might could just learn to read that way?"

"What? No. It doesn't work like-"

"Have you _tried_ it?"

Alex blinked. "Yes, actually. He ate the manual to your Blackberry."

"He what?"

"Ate the manu-"

Desmond threw a hand up. "Okay, got it. Luckily I know how to use my phone just fine."

Deon was running his fingers all over the painted tiles, as if to absorb the phonics through touch alone. A small sliver of wood flaked off, and many tiny tendrils came from his fingers to futz with it, flipping the flake over and over, breaking it into smaller bits.

Then the tendrils closed over those bits.

"Don't eat that," Desmond adminished, giving him a quick rap on the knuckles. "We'll have food soon enough."

Dana's present was a dark red ball of cloth, about five inches diameter, with filaments of yarn sewn onto it at intervals. Deon squeezed it and it produced a chirrupy squeak, making him smile.

Dr. Ragland chuckled incredulously. "So they do sell a toy version of Blacklight after all."

"Nah," Dana said, "I just made it myself from stuff at the craft store."

"Well. It's a fantastic piece of work."

Next Deon unwrapped Kel's gift: a 30-fl-oz jar of baby oil. "Change it out every three thousand miles!" Kel advised with a smile.

There were a few ticks of silence while people tried to figure out if he was joking. (He wasn't.) Alex patted him on the back and said a sincere "Thank you."

From Janet came an album already half-filled with photos from Deon's earlier stages of life. Desmond flipped through it with a sigh. "Man, can you believe this?" He turned the book around to show Deon a photo from the day of his birth.

Deon poked a finger at the bald infant. "Whozzat?"

"That's you. Just one year ago today you were a teeny weeny thing."

"I was a teeny weeny... but now I'm biggy wiggy!" Deon pumped his arms in the air.

Alex laughed. "You got a ways to go before I'd call you 'big'."

"I wanna get big!" Deon shuffled in his seat and looked longingly at the cake and steak. "Can we eat now? Presents are done."

"All right, all right." Alex moved the gifts aside and brought the steak tray over, cutting it in two to share between them. Deon tore into his larger portion messily with a spork while the human partygoers served themselves pieces of cake.

Desmond sat down beside Alex. "You gave him over two-thirds of it?"

"He needs a lot of protein to grow," Alex said in defense.

"Yes, yes." Desmond acquiesced, and leaned over to wipe a blob of icing off Deon's hair. "Try not to grow up too fast, alright kid? Try to enjoy childhood while you can."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Kel and Dani who helped with ideas~


	10. Assortment

Deon's growth rate let up a little bit after his first birthday; he stopped gaining weight and height so rapidly, although he hadn't stopped altogether, not by a long shot. His teeth had long since all grown in, too, and some informal bets were made on whether he'd lose the first set or if these were permanent.

Thanks to William's gift, he picked up the basics of reading pretty quickly, memorizing the sound each letter made and stringing them together with few errors. Desmond often found at bedtime that Deon would want to read books to _him_. One day he got his hands on a medical journal from Ragland somehow, and spent several hours going through it page-by-page, syllable-by-syllable, gleefully pronouncing complex words like "immunohistochemistry", "antiretroviral", "pathogenesis", "coproantigens", et cetera.

He loved the plush squid Rebecca had gotten him, and one day asked his Dad and Daddy (for that was what he now called Alex and Desmond, respectively) if they could get a real squid.

"Bruh, squids are not pets," Desmond said, after he'd finished laughing. "Maybe we could just get a dog or something?"

"Dogs are so loud, and so much hassle to wash and walk and train," Alex complained. "It'd never work out."

"A cat, then?"

"Cat food is f... freaking expensive," Alex said, censoring himself because Deon was a little language sponge. "And Dana's allergic."

"Jesus, okay, fine, what pet _should_ we have?"

"A snake?"

Desmond nixed that idea. "Snakes freak me out."

"What. Why. It's basically just a tentacle."

"A snake is not a tentacle, man, a snake is like- you have to feed it live mice and bugs and stuff- and what if it escapes the cage, I'd have nightmares about it curling up in my shoe and-"

In the end they got a carrier pigeon, whom they named "Aiden". Aiden didn't need a super large cage or super expensive foods or a super lot of maintenance. The Mercer-Miles family amused themselves using him to deliver scraps of paper with encoded messages to dens in the other boroughs of New York.

 

* * *

 

"So, Deon's a pretty cool kid."

"He is."

"You ever think about having another?"

Alex was silent exactly three seconds before giving a response. "Yes. I've thought about it."

"Well, me too. And I kinda want to."

Another three-second silence. "...Maybe." He turned to Desmond, eyes open and sincere. "You'd really like to try it?"

Desmond sniggered. "I don't think it's a matter of 'trying'. I mean, you got knocked up the very first time I came inside you, so it's-"

"You might be a different story."

Desmond made a strange gagging sound: "Haghh."

"Birth and recovery wouldn't be as easy," Alex said matter-of-factly.

"Fuck, man! You're talking about knocking **me** up!?"

Alex's brow twitched. "Yes. You just said you wanted to."

"Okay, **major** miscommunication there. I meant 'I want to have another kid with you', not 'I want to get pregnant'! It probably wouldn't even work with me, 'cause I'm not Blacklight!" 

"You never know until you try."

"I dunno, man." Desmond felt a little queasy just thinking about it. "How would that even physically work?"

Alex stared into the sky. Clouds roiled overhead in the rushing breeze. "Same as it did with me. The cells of my sexual emission would take root inside you, merge with your DNA. The Blacklight material would form a protective barrier around-"

"Form it **where** though? And please don't say up my butt!" he quickly added. "That part of my body has a specific biological function, man, and that function is **not** 'growing babies'!"

Alex smirked. "Its function isn't being fucked, either, and you have no problem with that."

Desmond snorted out a quick laugh. "Okay, fair point, but still. If a baby started growing there, I really think it'd be detrimental! To both me and the baby! My insides aren't just a buncha biomass that can be shifted into whatever!"

"Mrm." Alex nodded.

"Yeah. So it'd have to be you."

"Obviously."

"Right so," Desmond shifted closer to lean against him, "whattya say?"

"...I don't want to."

"Oh, come **on**."

"Hm." Alex developed a leering grin. "Cumming 'on' or 'in', either way would probably work. Blacklight is nothing if not flexible."

Desmond snorted again. "I've jizzed on your face lots of times and you never got pregnant from it."

"I was never trying to absorb it. And I've switched off my... conception mechanism."

"Switched off?" 

Alex shrugged. "Well, yeah. We discovered it by complete accident, but after I knew it was there, I was able to isolate the power and deactivate it."

"Oh. So you... can't have any more kids," Desmond said, looking away to hide his slight sorrow.

Alex directed Desmond's face back with a gentle finger on his chin. "Now, now. I didn't say it was **permanently** deactivated."

 

* * *

 

"Why can't I go out?" Deon demanded, pushing tendrils from under his feet to stand on tiptoe and lean forward a bit while scowl-pouting up.

But try as he might, he was only a little over half Desmond's height, and so the attempt to look imposing sorta failed.

Desmond gave him a sympathetic head-pat. "It's a big scary world out there, kiddo, and I want you to be safe."

"But you go out all the time and you're just a human!" Deon recently was starting to grasp this concept: that he and Alex were not the same class of being as the other people he knew. It had begun when Desmond had papercut himself while turning the pages of a book during the informal in-home schooling they were doing. The bright red well of blood had both fascinated and disgusted Deon, and their social studies lesson had quickly shifted into a primer on biology.

However this, today, was the first time he'd wielded the concept to try and place himself as superior to the humans' level. Of course he didn't mean any malice by it, but it still stung a little.

Shoulders tensed, Desmond closed his eyes briefly before exhaling, crouching down and looking Deon in the eye. "Yes, I'm a human. But that doesn't mean I'm less good at things. I'm actually really really good at protecting myself. And protecting other people too. It's kinda my job."

"Your job's Assassin, though. That means killing," Deon stated, just a reciting of a neutral fact.

"Well- Okay but it's-" Desmond was on the defensive now- "there's more than just killing involved, all right? Being an Assassin is _at heart_ about protecting people. Protecting innocent people, by stopping non-innocent people doing bad things. And there's a lot of bad things going on these days. So, that's why you can't go out." He sat back and crossed his arms with a definitive nod.

"I goed out before, though!"

" _Gone_ out. When have you gone out?"

"You gone to Texas last year and I gone out to run around the buildings and trees."

"What?! How did- Wasn't anyone watching you?"

Deon nodded once. "Grampa and Gramma. We all did a big running. All everywhere."

Desmond clenched a fist and swore to himself he would have words with his parents about this unreported excursion. "Okay, fine, but as _your daddy_ , I don't think you should go outside and run around like that until you're older."

"How about when he turns two?"

Two faces swiveled to look at Alex: Deon's with gladness, Desmond's with not-quite-sure-ity.

"Be a hell of a present, right?" Alex touseled Deon's hair. "What'cha say? Just you and me, tour around the island, see the landmarks."

"I dunno about this," Desmond said, putting a hand on Alex's shoulder.

Alex looked back at him. "You want him indoors his whole life? Like some sort of prisoner?"

Desmond drew back. "Oh. No. I- of course not. I just..."

"Just _what_."

"The bad guys still don't know about him, far as we can tell," Desmond said in a slightly lower voice. "If they find out we have a kid, they could use him as leverage."

Alex scrunched his face. "By that logic, no good guys should ever have kids."

"I'm just worried, okay."

"S'not like I'll take him to visit Abstergo HQ or anything. You've got to let him see the world a little." Alex stepped closer, putting his face right up in Desmond's face. "Don't keep him cooped up like Bill did with you."

And _that_ , of course, made Desmond see reason and agree.

"Yaaay!" Deon clapped vigorously. "Gonna be so fun!"

And yes, a couple months later it was indeed fun, that day they spent racing over rooftops, seeing the sights, peoplewatching, and hijacking a helicopter.


	11. Whole World of Possibilities

"Desmond! Alex!" Harlan waved exhuberantly as they approached up the gangplank. "Great to see you again, it's been too long! Oh, and your son, oh wow!" He leant in to get a closer look at him. "Definitely got those Mercer genes."

Though Deon's hazel eyes were clearly a hand-down from Desmond, his darker hair and paler skin did indeed make him more resemble Alex. "Hello," he said cutely, not shy at all. "My name's Deon."

Harlan smiled and shook hands with him. "Hi Deon, I'm Harlan. I've known your dads since back before you were born."

"Dad and Daddy, you mean?"

Harlan put on a mock-apologetic look. "Oh, of course, yes, I misspoke."

Another man walked up from behind Harlan. Desmond recognized him as Arend from the invitation's photo; that low-mohawk hairstyle was unmistakable.

"Babe, who's these-" he started, but then interrupted himself with a hearty laugh. "Oh yes! The amazing Desmond Miles! Or Mercer-Miles, rather!" He shot a grin over to Alex.

Alex answered with just a small smile and nod. 

"You shoulda been at these guys' wedding, Arend, it was one heck of an event," Harlan said. "But I think we may have them beat; theirs wasn't on a ship out in the wide beautiful sea!" He spread his arm out, directing their view to the blue-green vista all around.

"I dun' like the sea," Deon said, putting his hands up like blinders on either side of his face.

"Aw, what?" Arend couldn't believe what he was hearing. "Who doesn't like the sea?"

"I don't. It's too big and wet and-"

"It's fine, you don't have to explain yourself," Desmond said. "We'll go below deck 'til the ceremony starts." He took Deon's hand to lead him, and looked to Alex, wondering if he might be experiencing the same hydrophobia. "Alex, you good?"

"I'm fantastic," Alex replied.

Desmond smiled. "You sure are."

 

* * *

 

Desmond brought Deon down below deck to a playroom where a few other Assassin children- five-year-old Joey Frye, four-year-old Clara Criswell, and two-year-old Michelle Bellamy- were playing with various cheap toys.

Clara's mom, Heidi, greeted Desmond warmly, made a few seconds of polite conversation, then got him agreeing to stay and supervise the kids while she went out to stretch her legs.

Deon sat himself down in an empty spot and started picking up scattered Legos, methodically bricking them together in monocolored walls. When he'd cleared the area directly surrounding him, he went on further, stretching tendrils out in slow exploration of the messy floor.

Joey cried out "Hey!" when one of the tendrils picked up a Lego near him, then looked up from the castle he was building to see where the tendril came from. "Hey!" he said again. "Hey stop! You're doing it wrong!"

Deon paused and looked at him expectantly. Smaller tendrils fluttered about from his shoulders.

Joey got up and toddled over to Deon. "You're doing it wrong," he said again, and kicked over the little wall of blue bricks. "You gotta make things, real things that look like things."

"Hey now," Desmond interjected calmly, "we all have our own style of play. Remember, everything's permitted."

"But he's taking all the pieces for himself!" Joey cried to Desmond.

"Arright arright. Deon, let's share." Desmond came over, squatted down and started breaking off bricks. "C'mon, I know you like 'em all sorted and together, but Joey's gonna show you how to mix 'em up and make new cool stuff. So Joey, show us whatcha got there?"

Joey wiped his nose and grinned. "Kay!" He picked up a little lego vehicle that he'd attached to a plastic horse using yarn. "This, it's a horse car! The good guys put the bad guys in it to drive them to the cops!"

Deon gave a small nod and a semi-interested "Mm."

Clara joined their huddle, brandishing a Barbie-type doll with Assassin robes. "I wanna help get the bad guys!"

"Okay!" Joey rummaged in a pile and pulled out a Hulk action figure. "Here, you be him," he said definitively, pushing the Hulk into Deon's hands. "Now let's find the bad guy! And watch out for Biters!"

 

* * *

 

Desmond watched over the children's eccentric gameplay until Michelle's father came and relieved him of that duty. He headed back up to the top deck, fixed himself a martini from the open bar, then turned to look for his husband. Alex wasn't usually a social kind of guy, he knew, so hopefully things were going okay with him.

After scanning the crowd for a bit he switched to Eagle Vision to make things quicker. Everyone shifted into neon-bright blue, but he spotted a smidge of gold across the deck, and headed over there.

 

* * *

 

"...lot of medical uses," an oak-brown man was saying to Alex, a petite Asian woman, and a stocky Scotsman, "but the knee-jerk reactionaries won't listen to logic on that front either!"

Desmond walked up and patted Alex's shoulder. "Hey, there you are. Introduce me to your friends?" He smiled at the unknown trio.

"Eric Cooper, Emmett Leary, Stephanie Chiu," Alex said, gesturing to each of them in turn.

"Hey Eric, Emmett, Stephanie; a pleasure." Desmond shook hands. "I'm guessing you know my name," he added with a little half-grin.

Eric nodded and smiled back. "Your reputation precedes you."

Desmond wasn't sure he would ever get over how every single Assassin on the planet, save the fresher recruits, all knew him by sight. _Maybe I should grow a beard or something._ "So, uh, what'cha talking about before I interrupted?"

"Oh... just stuff," Alex said. He tilted his champagne glass back and forth idly. "Science, medicine, society, et cetera."

"Yer virus here has some right savage thoughts on cisheteronormativity," Eric said, thick brogue making the last word nearly incomprehensible to Desmond.

Alex turned and put a hand on Desmond's shoulder. "Do you know how lucky you are? To live in a time and place that your love is celebrated? That your family and friends and colleagues don't treat the relationship of you and I or Arend and Harlan any less real than a relationship like Janet and William? There is still bias, still hatred in the world, but we are so lucky..." His voice was a bit hoarse by the end.

"You okay, bae?" Desmond pulled him closer. "You haven't gotten this emotional since.... well, since **our** wedding."

A bashful smile crossed Alex's face. "Suppose you could say weddings... bring out the pathos in this pathogen."

Emmett snorted. "Woah, what a pun! I hadn't figured you for a jokester, Alex!"

 

* * *

 

The ceremony was casual and brief, yet still quite heartfelt. In their vows, Harlan and Arend promised to always be there for each other: to share, to protect, to enjoy life to the fullest, and to never stop kicking ass.

Desmond had a great nostalgic smile on his face watching them. He leaned over and whispered to Alex, "I love weddings. We should go to more."

After two beats, Alex whispered back, puzzled. "But we can only go to ones we're invited to."

"Mm, yeah." Desmond closed his eyes and touched Alex's hand. "Maybe Clay an' Lucy will tie the knot sometime, huh? Or Dana an' Becca?" He looked forward a couple rows to that latter couple: Dana resplendent in a [knee-length red dress edged with punky lace](https://68.media.tumblr.com/7a7cdfe054fa22c7840640abdec0b5ca/tumblr_messaging_okks0bKICO1qzl8vv_1280.jpg), Rebecca loudly proud in a pink-purple-blue pantsuit. "Has she said anything about it to you?"

Alex chuckled quietly, the sound coming from low in his throat. "They only just officially started dating, Des. Not everyone wants to move their relationship along as fast as we did."

"I suppose not, yeah." Desmond patted the head of Deon seated on Alex's left. It was true, they had gone from friends to husbands pretty damn quickly. But if given the option, he wouldn't go back and change a thing.

 

* * *

 

The highlight of all the wedding gifts was a set of ornate throwing knives from William and Janet, engraved with the Assassin symbol and the word _Love_ in swooping script. "The lives of Assassins are hard," William said solemnly. "Humanity is forever balanced on the edge of a cliff; our job is to ensure that the balance never tips too far to the wrong side. One of the tools in our arsenal for keeping up the fight, even when it seems we may never win... is love."

Harlan smiled and turned to face the watching crowd. "Ol' Bill sure has a flair for the dramatic, huh." He turned the smile back to William. "But really, thank you."

"Pretty nifty, Dad," Desmond said, stepping up with Alex by his side. "Here's our gift." Alex carefully set the heavy package down on a table.

Arend and Harlan worked together to unwrap it and open the crate inside. "Oh wow. Ain't this a treat!" Harlan pulled out the bottles one by one. "Shiraz...Pinot Grigio... and Chianti! Wow!"

"Plus a nice pair of glasses to drink it with!" Arend traced his finger over the stylish crystalware.

Harlan grinned graciously. "Y'all didn't have to go all out like this. Just one wine would've been fine."

Desmond shrugged. "Hey, I couldn't decide. And my guy in Italy said he'd cut us a deal if we bought at least three."

 

* * *

 

After gifts it was time to eat. Even Deon joined the meal, having been coaxed to stay on deck by the promise of delicious salmon. He had one additional stipulation: that he wouldn't sit anywhere near the ship railing. So they seated him near the center, close to Harlan and Arend themselves.

Deon- being, well, you know- finished the meal quicker than most of the other people round the table, and, soon growing bored of quietly waiting, kicked off a conversation with their hosts. "So... you're both gay? Like Dad and Daddy?"

Alex didn't consider himself "gay" precisely- in truth he wasn't sure any one word could sum up his orientation- but he didn't wish to get into a conversation on that today, so he stayed quiet and let it be. 

Harlan smiled and nodded. "Yeah, and now we're married like them, too."

"I saw photos of Dad and Daddy getting married," Deon said, leaning in eagerly. "Dad was real big 'cause Daddy made me grow inside his body."

Arend spluttered a muffled laugh into his wine glass.

"Yeah, I remember, kid."

Deon's gaze flicked down to Harlan's waist, where a minor bit of flab pooched out. "Is your baby still tiny and just barely started?"

"Deon!" Desmond cut in quickly, blushing. "They're not having a baby, geez!"

Deon looked up at him, beginnings of confusion showing. "But if they're getting married, they have sex, right?"

"Boy howdy yes," Harlan snickered.

"And sex makes babies," Deon said to Desmond smartassedly.

"Oh my goddd." Desmond sunk his face into his hand. "Look, I thought we went over this before: Most men cannot have a baby."

A look of clarity broke over Deon. "Oh, yeah. I remember now."

"Would you want to, though, if you could?" Lucy asked the newlyweds, smirking.

Harlan and Arend exchanged a look. "Only if **you're** the pregnant one," they both said in unison, then busted out laughing.


	12. virus-detecting smartphone apps could exist

Some months after the wedding, they were out in Central Park on a rare non-mission-related excursion, because Arend and Harlan had come to visit with their new dog, Jamie. She was a a [Hungarian Puli, a boisterous mound of thickly coiled fur](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ehWwKSJQUbc), so long and shaggy Desmond had trouble believing there was an actual dog under all that.

Right now, Deon was having a blast throwing a tennis ball for Jamie to chase and retrieve over and over.

"Too bad Alex's not here," Desmond said from his watching spot on a nearby bench. "I bet he'd love this pupper."

"Then we'll just have to visit again once he's come back from beating the Templars outta Manila," Harlan said with a grin.

Actually he'd been grinning constantly all day. Everyone had. It was just that kind of day, the kind where the weather was perfect and nothing was going wrong.

Jamie brought the ball back to Deon for about the fiftieth time, scampering over to him and dropping it at his feet.

"Sorry, gotta take a break," Deon said, patting Jamie's head. "Gotta go to the bathroom." He looked around. "Umm. Where's the bathroom of this place?"

Desmond got up from the bench. "I think the port-o-potties are this way."

"What's a port-o-potty?"

Desmond snorted a laugh. "It's a really cheap small version of a normal bathroom." He took the boy's hand and they headed down the path. 

Over a little hill they went, and around a stand of trees, and across a bridge over a small creek, and finally they reached the corner of the park where the potties and some water fountains were.

"So these are port-o-potties. It's like a normal bathroom but smaller and way smellier," Desmond said. "Think ya can handle it?"

"Most probaly."

"Just don't fall in, lil guy," Desmond joked.

 

* * *

 

"It really does smell really bad in there," Deon said as he exited.

"Yeah, they always do," Desmond agreed with a nod. "Nobody likes using them if they can avoid it."

"And the water in it was a weird color!"

"Cause it's not water, it's some weird disinfectant stuff."

"Disinfectant?" Deon winced. "Like to kill a virus?"

"Oh, you'll be fine, lil guy," Desmond said quickly. He gestured back toward the bridge. "C'mon, lets get on back."

As they headed back into the main park area, Deon carefully calculated his steps so as not to tread on any lines in the walkway. Desmond smirked watching him. _Step on a crack, break your mama's back, huh? But he only has papas, not mamas...._

He was about to say something pointing this out, but just then a couple came up and stood in their path.

"Oh, what a darling little boy!" said one of them, a tall tan woman with a beauty mark under her mouth.

"Thanks," Desmond said.

The man that was with her, a stout and sturdy type, didn't say anything. He was playing with some app, moving his phone around in the air.

The woman knelt down to eye-level with Deon. "Hello dear."

"Hello. My name's Deon."

"Is it now, hmm." The woman seemed to be appraising him, in a sort of calculating way. "Are you from around here?"

"Yeah," Deon said with a nod.

Still looking at his phone, the man started walking, and passed behind Desmond.

"Yeah, he's Manhattan born and raised," Desmond said. "How about yourself?"

The woman looked up at him and snapped her fingers.

Something large and blunt _whapp_ ed the back of Desmond's head, and everything went dark.

 

* * *

 

Some people were yelling in the distance. Their voices were hollow and indistinct, though.

Groaning, Desmond rolled over onto his back. His head hurt like the dickens. And the yelling wasn't helping with that. "God, shut up..." He wiped off some leaves that were stuck on his face and tried sitting up, only to be met with prickly bush branches. "What the?"

With difficulty (the ground seemed to wobble beneath him) he crawled out of the bushes and tried to look around. Everything was blurry and jittery. "Damn, what happened? Am I fucking drunk? And shit, where's Deon?"

The yells were becoming clearer. "...esmond! Desmooonnnd!"

He waved in the direction the yells were coming from. "I'm over here!"

Thundering footfalls answered him, and soon some familiar blurry figures came over a nearby hill. A tangle of black fur that was Jamie reached him first, and then Arend and Harlan. "Whoa, what happened to you?" Harlan asked, kneeling to help Desmond up. "You look a sight!"

"I- I dunno," Desmond stammered, struggling with a bit of nausea. "There was this lady, talking to Deon, and then I think her husband knocked me out." He touched a hand gingerly to the back of his head and felt dry blood. "Oh damn, he got me good."

"Verdomme," Arend said with soft realization. "I saw a gang of military-types a few minutes ago, while we were spread out looking for you."

"And?" Harlan prompted.

"They were heaving a metal crate into their van."

A pang of fear struck Desmond's heart. "You don't think... they got Deon?"

Arend looked across the field, scanning yet again for any sign of the black-haired tyke. Still, he was nowhere to be seen.

"Fuck," Desmond said.

Jamie let out a passionate whine.


	13. Dark Before The Dawn

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **content warning!** : imprisonment, medical experiments/needles, "it" pronouns, vaguely described child death

"Desmond," Shaun said ominously as Desmond passed by his open door. "Come and listen to this snippet I caught off a Templar phone log."

Desmond had just been on the way to go report Deon's kidnapping to Bill, but Shaun sounded upset enough that he figured he'd stop and see what was up. "Snippet?" he asked, coming over to Shaun's desk.

Shaun hit a key and some staticky audio played. First spoke a young, androgynous voice. " _Hey you heard? Blackwatch finally got Zeus in custody, thank fuck for that, we can stop worrying about an invincible monster guarding the Assas-_ "

" _Sht!_ " a second voice hissed. " _Call me back on the secure line, dumbass._ " Then the recording clicked off.

Shaun turned in his chair to face Desmond. "That was quite bizarre, you know. Because I received word from Dani that the Manila mission was a resounding success and everyone including Alex is fine. So, either Blackwatch is flat-out lying to the Templars, or-"

"They actually have Deon, not Alex," Desmond said. The words fell out of him, sad and trembling.

Shaun exhaled. "I was afraid that was the case."

Arend was standing in the doorway now, looking stricken. "I'm so fucking sorry, Des. When I saw those army guys, I should've figured they were up to something, I shoul-"

Desmond interrupted, saying, "Don't beat yourself up about it. What we gotta do now is track down where they took him." He looked back to Shaun. "You picked up any more snippets about the capture?"

"Unfortunately not," Shaun said, tapping a couple keys idly. "I've been almost completely focused on surveilling the Templars, not Blackwatch, since the former is the bigger threat to us lately. All I could gather from the latter were some uninformative messages saying they have a 'priority one subject en route', but I can't get where he's en route to."

"Subject, god _damn_." Desmond hung his head, automatically thinking of the seventeen Abstergo subjects. He had no idea what Blackwatch was planning to do to Deon, but it certainly wouldn't be anything fun.

 

* * *

 

OCTOBER 15 2016

Subject was located in Central Park masquerading as small child (alias "Deon"). Apprehended without incident and now restrained for examination. Administered compound X539 to suppress weaponization; looks to be working exactly as designed. Subject has been mostly noncombative, nonverbal. Dr. Ammash will assist me with extraction of intel once she arrives. - ABROOKS

Dr. Brooks e-signed the note and looked up from her laptop to the window separating her office and the containment cell, where the subject was fastened securely to an exam table. "It must have learned somehow that children are not seen as threatening, and thus it could escape notice by taking this form," she mused to herself.

She buzzed a button on the wall. "Major, I'm going to take a sample while I'm waiting for Ammash."

"Acknowledged," Major Kassir replied through the comm. "Hold off a minute though, I'm sending down an officer for your protection."

Dr. Brooks scoffed quietly. "It can't attack in any meaningful way with X539 in effect."

"You and I both know that compound is unproven," Kassir said sharply. "True, it hasn't attacked us _yet_ , but don't get cocky. Do not enter that room without an armed officer present. That's an order."

"Thanks for your concern."

 

* * *

 

"Reporting for duty, doc." Specialist Collins gave a perfunctory salute. A moment later he spotted Deon through the small window. "Hey, I- I've seen this kid before!" He pointed, poking a finger on the glass.

"That's no child," Dr. Brooks said, pushing his arm down. "Don't let its appearance fool you, it's still Blacklight."

"I ran across him a while back, on recon with Huber," Collins said, thinking back to that day. "Hell of a weird encounter."

"You can treat me to the retrospective later," Dr. Brooks said. "For right now, just please be quiet and cover me while I collect samples." She held her badge up to the computerized lock, and a series of soft blips played as it scanned the barcode. She then entered a PIN to finalize unlocking the containment cell.

In the center of the wide empty room, Deon was restrained with half-a-dozen straps of reinforced polyester across his body, as well as metal cuffs on each limb. Though unable to move, he watched with eagle eyes as Spc. Collins and Dr. Brooks approached. His lip trembled unsteadily, like he was on the verge of saying something, but obvious fear held his tongue.

From the spacious pocket on her lab coat, Dr. Brooks got out gloves and put them on. And then from the same pocket she produced a syringe. The reservoir was empty, thick and long, with marks on the side measuring up to 100 cc.

"Whuf, how much are you planning to take out, doc?"

Dr. Brooks shot Collins a glare. "I _said_ be _quiet_." Then, without warmup or warning, she thrust the needle into Deon's upper arm.

At this intrusion Deon wailed, shrill and sad, and began to writhe ineffectually against his restraints.

Collins looked away.

"Are you feeling _sorry_ for it?" Dr. Brooks asked scornfully as she withdrew the plunger. "What the hell kind of soldier are you? This thing has killed humans by the boatload."

A flame sparked in Deon's eyes. "Nu-uh! I killed nobody!"

"Spare us the innocent child act." Dr Brooks pulled a little harder on the plunger. A thick goopy material was filling up the syringe; a swirling mixture of cloudy gray, raven black, and brickhouse red.

Deon's eyes flicked around the room, from the nervous fidget of Collins' finger on the magazine of his Beretta to the glare of the fluorescent lights on the thick glass window, finally settling on the security badge reading _August Brooks, PhD_. "Please stop... August, please stop," he pleaded.

She pulled the syringe out and twisted a cap on to cover the needle.

Deon breathed a sharp gasp of gratitude.

"Let's go," Dr. Brooks said, turning businesslike back to the door. "I don't like looking at it."

"That's not Zeus," Collins said as soon as they were in the hall again. His words were hesitant, unsure of what outcome might be caused by that information.

Ripping off her gloves, Dr. Brooks didn't hear him. She tossed the gloves into a biohazard bin and rushed to the sink to scrub up her hands. "That bastard virus," she muttered, soaping up vigorously. "Should've never been created... everything's gone to hell since Mercer let it loose..." She sniffed and wiped a quick tear from her eye, remembering in an unwanted flash the last seconds of her son's life.

Danny had been almost six. He didn't know the first thing about biowarfare or genetic research. Dr. Brooks had pulled into the parking lot of PS 340. She had seen him swinging carefree on the playground, and called out that it was time to go home. He had jumped off the swing and started heading over.

And suddenly the Blacklight virus, nearly silent despite running at breakneck speed, had crashed through the playscape.

Shards of high-velocity debris had flown everywhere.

By the time Dr. Brooks had realized the horror before her, Zeus was a mile away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wait wasn't this fic supposed to be feelgood fluff? I'm so sorry


	14. 3200 words? what sorcery is this?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> continued imprisonment, more injections, withholding of food, and brief violent scene

"Hm. They've got some quite tricky encryption on their network."

"You can crack it, though, right?"

"Yes, with time." Shaun glanced up at Desmond. "You doubt my abilities?"

Desmond still had the same face of worry that he'd been wearing ever since he'd woken up under a bush and realized Deon was gone. "How _much_ time?"

Shaun made a _pff_ noise and went back to concentrating on the screen.

"How much time?!" Desmond asked again.

"Not more than a day, all right," Shaun said, understanding his anxiety. "It's not going to go any faster with you standing over me, though."

Desmond stepped away and sighed. "God dammit. Deon's trapped in a box somewhere and who knows what they're gonna do to him, and all I can do is wait."

"Get some sleep," Shaun advised. "It'll do you good."

"I'll goddamn try, but I dunno if I can." Desmond waved halfheartedly and left the room.

 

* * *

 

Uninterested in listening to Collins, Dr. Brooks took the syringe away to the lab on an upper deck for testing, leaving the soldier alone to guard the subject.

Collins watched for a while through the reinforced window, many thoughts running through his head about the little boy inside. It looked like the boy was sobbing silently, chest heaving under the restraints. 

After a while, Collins stepped closer and knocked gently on the glass. "Hey. Kid."

Deon opened his eyes and looked at him plaintively.

"I feel for you, kid."

Deon didn't answer. His Daddy had said one time that when enemies were nearby, you should stay quiet. And so he'd hardly spoken at all since his capture. But that tip didn't seem to be doing any good.

"I know you're not Zeus. I know you're his son. Remember, we met that one time?" Collins said, keeping his voice gentle and nonthreatening. "What's your name?"

"What's _your_ name?" Deon asked back at him.

Collins saw him speak but didn't hear. "Hang on, just a sec." He swiped his badge on the lock and put in the same PIN Dr. Brooks had used. He was half surprised that this actually worked to open the door. "Huh! Wasn't sure my badge'd have access."

Deon squinted at him.

"You remember me?" He stepped into the room cautiously and took one hand off his firearm to wave a little greeting. "Fred Collins."

"Fred Collins," Deon mumbled. "You... look like my doctor friend."

"Doctor friend. Who's that?"

"R-ragland."

"Oh, him! That brother still kicking around?" Collins pulled a crate over to sit down near the table. "Good to hear. He was an all right guy; just got caught on the wrong side."

Deon made a little "mmm" noise.

"I didn't catch your name," Collins said.

A stiff pause, and then: "My name's Deon."

"Deon, huh."

"Deon Ellis Mercer-Miles," Deon said softly.

Collins nodded slowly. "Good name.... I know where the Mercer comes from. But who's Miles?"

Deon jerked his head to suddenly look away from him. "Shouldn't talk to you. You're a bad guy."

"How am I a bad guy?"

Deon frowned harder. He couldn't put together the words for his answer from the angry tornado in his head. It was obvious, anyway.

"I work for some people that wanna stop your dad making trouble. Ain't my fault you're tied up right now. They got you by mistake."

"Then make them let me go."

Collins shrugged. "I'll try, but seems they don't like to listen to me. Maybe it's my own fault, not telling them about you after we met." He unstrapped his carbine and placed the weapon down atop a cabinet.

Deon looked back at the sound of metal on metal.

Collins held up both his hands. "That's me putting my gun down. Ain't gonna shoot you. Far as I can see, you're an innocent kid, no matter what Brooks said."

"And... you don't hurt innocents?"

"Nope, not if I can avoid it."

Deon was quiet again after this. The fluorescent bulbs above them hummed.

 

* * *

 

Desmond lay despondent on Alex's couch, thinking of him. _If he were here, he'd have already run off to get Deon back. He wouldn't even think twice, probably set off another city-wide panic... No, if he were here, Deon wouldn't even've been taken in the first place._ "Ugggh." He rubbed his hands roughly across his face. "Hate just lying here."

"Well you're in luck then," came a voice, and Desmond sat up quickly. Shaun had let himself into the apartment. "I have news, and it'll give you something to do."

The decryption effort had been successful, and they'd found the location where Deon had been taken to: a science facility on the mainland. So they assembled a small team. Arend and Harlan were insistent upon going- not that they needed to insist; their skill and strength were quite evident. Those two could go on any mission they wanted.

Anyway, along with the married musclemen, Desmond was also going (of course) and so was Shaun (in case any further hacking was needed) and Dana (as the getaway driver for their small van). Rebecca kissed her good luck right before they pulled out of the garage, and Desmond had to look away, for it gave him a little sting of longing for Alex.

 

* * *

 

"Fred? Could you untie me, please?"

Collins looked down the length of the table Deon was fixed to.

"I promise I'll be good."

"Don't think I can, actually." Collins tapped the metal cuffs. "These things don't open with a badge and PIN like the door does."

"There's a key! I saw it, but I dunno where it is."

Collins leaned on one arm over the table. "And I dunno either. Can't you just sit tight for now? In a little bit, some people're gonna come grill you for intel, and you can tell 'em you're not the guy they think."

Deon stiffened up. "They're gonna grill me?"

Collins shrugged. "They'll ask where your base of operations is, stuff like that."

Deon relaxed halfway. "Interrogate me, you mean."

Collins nodded. "They're not stupid. They'll eventually figure out you're not Zeus."

"And then they'll let me go?"

There was a pause, a pause that stretched out and became very uncomfortable for Collins. Finally he said, "Well shoot. Frankly, the chances are they won't."

Deon frowned. "Dad and Daddy will come for me, you know."

"Well, one of those is the guy they meant to bring in, so that's not gonna be a problem in their eyes." Just as he finished talking, a mechanical-static sound blorped from his belt. He grabbed up the radio that hung there and held it to his face. "Collins here."

"The fuck are you doing inside the containment cell?!" a voice blasted back at him. "That virus'll eat you alive once the compound wears off!"

"Sir, I- this subject has been misidentified," Collins said as he got up and faced the surveillance camera. Major Kassir must've not been watching the feed until just now. "It's not Zeus, it's his son."

"The fuck are you talking about?"

 

* * *

 

The day was a hot one, and perhaps that was why a vent window was open along the ground. Desmond slipped in, finding himself in a partially-buried basement. Blackwatch had their power generators down here, big bulky black machines churning and sputtering, and so even with the window open it was uncomfortably warm. He could've shut down the generators there and then, but that would definitely be noticed, and they needed to stay undetected as long as possible.

Shaun dropped through the window next. "I don't think you two will fit," he said to Arend and Harlan left crouched outside. "You stay and keep watch, yeah? At least until we run into trouble."

"Let's hope you don't," Harlan said, "but if you do, just holler and we'll bust in through a door."

Desmond led the way, watching out for soldiers as they slunk along the hallways. They ran into a couple of patrolling pairs, but tranq-darts quickly put them out of commission for the next hour or two.

A part of him wanted to end their lives, but they'd decided against that after some pre-mission deliberation. It seemed from Shaun's scan of their servers that Blackwatch didn't know much if anything about the Assassins, and ideally the Assassins would like it to stay that way. Killing mass swathes of their soldiers would almost certainly result in unwanted retribution, if not from Blackwatch themselves, then from their de facto protectors in the Templar ranks.

So they stayed low-profile, slinking their way up from the basement, Shaun using a small gadget to wirelessly rewrite the security cameras' programming so they wouldn't be spotted. "You see where they're keeping Deon at yet?" Desmond whispered once they'd gone up a few floors.

"Nothing yet." Shaun's gadget looked a lot like a 3DS XL, which made sense because that's what Rebecca had constructed it from. He poked around on the little keyboard that she'd replaced the bottom screen with. "Hello hello. Looks like there's a computer here unconnected to their servers." He licked his lip. "I bet they keep the most juiccy data on there, where no outsider can pick at it."

So they headed that way.

 

* * *

 

"Zeus' **son**?!"

"For the fifth time, **yes**!" After a beat, Collins added, "Sir."

Major John Kassir would not ever have been described as a flexible-minded man. He looked over at the window into the containment cell again. "We would have known if there were **two** virus beasts on the prowl," he said through his teeth.

"Not if one's just a kid, sir."

Kassir scowled at Deon a bit more.

Shoes clicking quickly on the metal, Dr. Brooks came down the hall to join them. "Major, the DNA sequencer is all jacked up! Contaminated my sample!" She brandished a handful of fresh printouts.

Kassir turned to face her. "Just what we need, another problem." He took the papers from her, though he couldn't understand what was meant by the jumbled letters printed across them. "Contaminated with what?"

"Human DNA! And I'm certain it wasn't by any fault of mine-"

Collins butted in. "No, see, this proves what I'm saying! He had this child with a human!"

Dr. Brooks looked at him with disdain.

Kassir brushed his graying hair behind an ear and gave Dr. Brooks a flat look. "Collins has this idea, that the subject is Zeus' offspring."

"It's more than an idea. I've seen Zeus and Deon together."

"Who's Deon?" Kassir asked.

" **That's** Deon!" Collins swung an arm to point at him. "The kid, the subject! I saw him with his dad earlier this year! He literally called Zeus his dad!" He realized his voice was getting loud, so stepped back and swallowed. "Apologies, sir, I didn't report it at the time."

"Withholding intel is a court-martialable offense," Kassir barked.

"Yes, yes, but listen, Zeus called him his son." Collins was trying to put on his most commanding and convincing face. "You've got an innocent kid in there, and he wants to be let go."

Kassir rubbed his beard. "Nnno, that's not going to happen. We can still get valuable information from the subject. He'll tell us where to find Zeus."

"Or maybe Zeus will come here to take him back and take us all out in the process," Collins said.

Dr. Brooks snorted. "Did you forget we're on a ship? Zeus can't cross water."

Kassir's radio blorped. "Major, Dr. Ammash has arrived, shall I send her down now?"

"Yeah, send her down here," Kassir answered the private, glancing between Collins and Deon. "There's been a little hiccup, but the interrogation will proceed just the same."

 

* * *

 

Meanwhile, the two Assassins had reached the non-networked computer and Shaun was digging through it for relevant data. He worked quietly, nodding and humming to himself, until at one point he said, "Well fuck."

Desmond did not like the sound of that. "Bad news?"

"Eugh." Shaun adjusted his glasses and scrolled down the screen a little. "They **did** bring Deon here initially, but he's somewhere else now; this was just a stopover."

Desmond kept his frustration in check and kept his eyes on the hallway directly leading to their location. "Where's he now?"

"U.S.A.V. Major General Robert Smalls."

"Okay let's find this Robert Smalls and kick his ass."

"It's a _ship_ , you knobhead," Shaun said, "hence U.S.A.V. - United States Army Vessel."

"Couldn't have just said that in the first place, could you?"

Shaun hit a command to transfer some data from the Blackwatch computer to his gadget. "Smalls was a major figure in your Civil War and afterward; I'm surprised you never heard of him."

"Shut up; I never relived the Civil War."

"Neither did I but I somehow learned about it. Funny, that."

"You're an ass."

"You're a bell-end."

For all appearances, one might have thought they were angry with each other, but really this back-and-forth teasing was like a familiar game. It sort of calmed Desmond to playfully bicker with Shaun, because complete silence while on a mission made him anxious.

The data finished transferring, and Shaun unplugged the DS. "Shall we just head out, then, or poke around the rest of this place?"

"Sooner we get out, sooner we get to Deon," Desmond said without missing a beat.

And not one more beat after that, [a klaxon sounded, blaring and beeping](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=faprZlhrjpo) while red lights flashed from the ceilings. "Shit, someone must've found the guys we knocked out." Desmond pushed Shaun ahead of him and they started to sneak back the way they came. 

Thundering footfalls soon followed them. Desmond looked back and saw a half-dozen Blackwatch security enforcers crowding around a corner, guns out and ready.

"Fucking run!" Desmond shouted to Shaun, and they dashed off, bolting to the stairwell and taking it three-steps-at-a-time down. Desmond leaped the final flight of steps, landing atop another Blackwatch soldier and knocking him, bruised and winded, out on the floor. He grabbed Shaun and pushed him forward. "Go, go, let's go!"

Outside the stairwell they saw a second batch of enforcers amassing by the hall going back to the basement, so they had to turn and go for another exit. Shaun was on his communicator now. "Dana, gather the guys and have the van ready to roar out of here ASAP!"

They turned another corner to see the exit door ahead. A flare of instinct hit Desmond and moved him to run faster, even faster than he'd already been going. A burst of gunfire sounded and he felt a hot pain in his back, but he kept running. The second he was out the door, he dashed left out of the line of fire, scrambled up over a wall, not even caring that it was topped with barbed wire.

In another half-minute they were back at the truck and Arend was pulling Shaun up and Harlan was pulling Desmond up and they were speeding away.

"I got shot," Desmond said breathlessly, slumping face-first onto blankets on the floor. The words came out in a breathless slur, more like "aghasha," but nevertheless Harlan was already tearing off his bloodsoaked shirt and soon a stinging liquid was pouring over his back.

"Missed your spine, thank fuck," Harlan said. "Silver lining every cloud, huh?"

"What about Deon?" Arend asked Shaun.

"They've got him on a ship, the Major General Robert Smalls."

"And where's that?"

"That, I have yet to determine," Shaun said, looking down at his screen.

 

* * *

 

Dr. Abal Ammash was a small woman, tan with thick hair trimmed severely short. She exuded a confident vibe as she entered the containment cell, backed up by Dr. Brooks and two armed privates.

"I understand you believe Zeus is your father," she said after pulling up a chair to sit beside Deon.

Deon pouted. "I don't know any Zeus."

"He calls himself Alex Mercer, is that right?"

"No. His name's Alex Mercer-Miles. 'Cuz he's married."

Dr. Brooks was already scrawling notes on her tablet: _Virus mimicking human social rituals - is allegedly "married"._

"Who's he married to?" Dr. Ammash asked next.

Deon clamped his mouth shut and looked away.

"Who's your mother?"

Again, no answer. Dr. Brooks scrawled _Person of interest: unidentified mother, surname Miles. Can narrow search through DNA sample?_

"Where do you live?"

"Apartment 303," Deon said, and stuck out his tongue.

Metal rang when Dr. Ammash slapped her hand down on the table. "Don't toy with us, child. This is a matter of national security."

"Why?" Deon retorted.

"Be _cause_ your father is a menace to society, a dangerous weapon."

"You're lying. He's nice to me. He's nice to everyone. He only attacks bad guys."

"And who decides who are the bad guys?"

Deon fell silent. The floor was yawing, back and forth subtly as the waves moved the ship. He didn't know how much more of it he could take.

"Are you hungry, Deon?"

Silence.

"We could give you food if you give us information."

"That's mean."

"That's how it will work here." Dr. Ammash stood up. "I will return tomorrow morning to see if you feel more co-operative."

Deon grunted and struggled his limbs against the bindings. A small blade grew out from his palm.

"Give him X539 again," Dr. Ammash ordered Dr. Brooks. "The initial dose is wearing off."

Dr. Brooks nodded and got a syringe out from a high cupboard. Though it was much smaller than the one she'd used to draw a sample earlier, it still stung and upset Deon when she jabbed it in his arm. His heart beat frantically, and within a few seconds the blade withered away. Once again he was helpless.

 

* * *

 

It continued like that, the next day and the next.

Deon's only solace was Fred Collins. This man would come in about an hour after each interrogation attempt and surreptitiously slip him a bit of nutrition in the form of a vitamin pill or a protein bar or a hot dog. And they would talk. Real talk, although nothing relating to Dr. Ammash's main questions: nothing about his other parent or his home location.

The Major didn't know about the food-sneaking, but he allowed the talks, in hope that some bit of useful intel might slip loose, seeing that Collins and the boy had established a sort of rapport.

"I wish I had some of my stuffies or fidgies," Deon confessed the third time they spoke.

"Your what now?"

"My stuffies are Ruben, and Squiddy, and Lemon, and Victor."

"Stuffed animals, oh."

"Ruben's a Rubella virus, and Squiddy's a giant squid. I was bad at making good names," Deon explained with a roll of his eyes, internally scoffing at his younger self. "Lemon's an octopus and Victor's a Blacklight virus."

"Wait, there's _another_ Blacklight?"

"Not really. Victor's a toy. Rebecca made him."

"Rebecca, huh?"

"I'm not gonna say her whole name."

"I ain't asking you to," Collins said with an understanding smile. "What's she like, though?"

"She's cool. She can build a lot of stuff out of anything. Like machines or toys or anything. And she got me Squiddy, but she didn't make her, she bought her. But I like Squiddy just the same even though she's from a store."

Collins hummed and nodded.

"Maybe Rebecca will come with them to help get me."

"She a soldier?"

"No, she- uhm. I'm not gonna say."

"Right, all right." The conversation often halted like this, and Collins was left to wonder just what exactly the kid's home life was like if so much of it was this classified.


	15. here comes trouble. it's me. i am the trouble.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> uhhh it gets real violent in here. but no worse violence than what's already in prototype, so yeah.
> 
> thanks to Dani for ideas and Kel for giving me a deadline lol (he also was the originator of the quote used for this chapter title)
> 
> and thanks to John/Emma and Nathan K for physics input

Back at the base, many resources were devoted to scanning the seas for the location of USAV Smalls. Desmond was back to more waiting again, as he'd been restricted to a bed in the medical wing for a full two days after the intense surgery to remove bullet fragments and set broken ribs.

As it happened, the very day after he was released from medical (albeit still feeling sore and instructed to take it easy for a couple months) was the day Alex arrived home.

Desmond and William were both at the door to greet him. "My favorite guy; finally back home," Desmond said. "What'cha got in the box?"

"Souvenir," Alex said simply. He opened the cardboard flaps to show what was inside: [a big basket woven of rattan fiber, shaped like a whale with a goofy wide open mouth and upturned tail.](https://68.media.tumblr.com/b0b6c292be39628fc6135a1cf87a5c84/tumblr_messaging_ornhejzUgO1sb81pn_1280.jpg)

"Aw, you didn't have to do that," said Desmond. He set the box on a table and hugged him.

Alex noticed the hug seemed a bit reserved, lacking Desmond's usual enthusiasm. When Desmond let go, Alex said, "You're injured?" The questioning intonation wasn't because he doubted it- he was quite sure that he'd felt some healing irregularities in the back of Desmond's torso.

"Mf, it's fine," Desmond said, rubbing his side and looking uneasy.

"What happened?"

"Nothing, nothing big. You just come to bed, okay, unwind from your mission." Desmond took Alex's arm and led him toward the stairs.

William watched, frowning. "Desmond, aren't you going to-"

"Shut up Dad," Desmond said, quickly but in a flat tone. He hustled Alex up the stairs and into their apartment. "I've missed you so much."

Alex was thinking about a reply, but then was mashed against the wall in a furious kiss. A shivering wave went through him, starting from the lips and flowing down as Desmond squeezed him tight.

_sudden- uncertain- intense- lonely-_

"Did you think of me a lot, while you were halfway around the world?" Desmond said huskily, lips brushing Alex's cheek. "Did you wish you had me there to work you over and de-stress you?"

"Des, stop." Alex pushed him off. "You're acting really weird."

"Weird?" Desmond laughed, weirdly. "What's 'weird' about wanting to make love to my husband?"

"It's weird you wanna make love when you're severely injured; it's weird you won't tell me how that injury happened." Alex's eyes narrowed perceptively. "And it's weird I don't smell Deon in the apartment."

Desmond pulled at his fingers. "Well uh, obviously I don't wanna make love while he's right here, ya know?"

"Where is he?"

Desmond exhaled, perhaps too strongly, because the action bothered his sore ribs and he grabbed his side and had to sit down suddenly.

Alex leaned over him, hands on Desmond's thighs softly. "Where is our son?" he asked in the calmest voice he could currently manage. It was quiet, but still had that undertone of menacing concern.

"He's... now please don't get mad. He's been taken."

"...Taken?"

"Urgh," Desmond groaned. "He was... kidnapped, I mean."

Alex's grip on his thighs tightened as his eyes went huge. "Now why should I **not** be mad about this?"

"I mean don't be mad at me, be mad at Blackwatch!"

"I think I'm mad at both!" Alex snapped, straightening back up. "They kidnapped him, and you for some reason thought I didn't deserve to know it?!"

"I was gonna tell you," Desmond said quickly, " _after_ I get you relaxed and calm with sex!"

Alex blinked. "What? You'd calm me down just to rile me up again with horrible news?!"

"Fuck." Desmond facepalmed hard. "Okay, maybe not the best plan. But I- I didn't want you rushing out to look for him and fucking things up more."

Alex shook a moment, fury boiling. It ran through him and bubbled over, turning his skin and clothes to matte-black armor. "Tell me _everything_ ," he said, each syllable very precise. "How long he's been gone. How they got him. _Any_ clues you have."

Desmond swallowed. "It's been, um, five, almost six days. A big goon knocked me unconscious while we were in the park, and they put him in a crate. Right now, as far as we know, he's on a ship called the Robert Smalls."

Alex tilted his head, but said nothing.

"And this-" Desmond gestured over his injury- "This was the price of finding that out. When we infiltrated their lab in the Bronx. They took him there first."

Alex, frowning, reached to touch Desmond's shoulder, and then stroked down his back. He could feel the layers of bandaging underneath the shirt. "Mnh."

"One of the shots almost punctured my lung, Ragland says."

Alex made a small sound and moved in to hug him.

"Gah," Desmond said, "that's a liiiitle uncomfortable with the armor."

Alex pulled his arms back immediately. "Sorry," he grumbled.

Desmond gave a small smile. "Un-armor yourself and you can hug me all you want."

"No. Not now." Alex stepped past him, over toward the balcony, and slung the door open. "Gonna go get Deon."

"Wh-fuck dude," Desmond sputtered quickly, "didn't you listen, we don't know where he goddamn _is_!"

"I'll find out."

" _Dude!_ " Desmond said again, more urgently, as he took hold of Alex's wrist to maybe keep him from leaving. "This is the exact reason I was worried about telling you, I knew your heroic ass would wanna run off immediately with no plan!"

Alex turned to him, sharp teeth bared. "If you'd shut up a moment, I'll use my radio transceiver to find that ship!"

"You could _what now?_ "

"I have," Alex slowed down for the rest of the sentence, "a Blackwatch radio transciever inside me."

Desmond blinked at him. "Really? I feel like that's not possible."

Of course it was possible, because it was the truth. Alex had consumed plenty of Blackwatch soldiers, and their clothes and equipment as well. It sure came in handy back when they were living on the run. Since settling down with the Assassins he hadn't had much need to monitor Blackwatch chatter, so he'd muted it. Alex shook his head hard. "Should I spend time trying to convince you, or should I go fucking rescue our son!?"

"W-wait a minute, lemme get some people to back you up."

 

* * *

 

He tried to insist he didn't need any backup, but in the end it was faster to just go with it. So he walked out of the base with Harlan and Arend following him, both strapped to the nines with weaponry.

First things first, they had to get a helicopter. Harlan knew of a lightly-guarded air base up on the north edge of the island, so they headed that way. All the while, Alex was scanning Blackwatch communications in his head, sifting through messages for anything relating to the kidnapped kid.

There wasn't much relevant info about him going over the radio right now, though. But Alex had a plan for fixing that. While Arend and Harlan were scaling the walls around the airfield, he slid under the door of the command office and slithered over to the commanding officer. Liutenant General Edward Raven was his name, Alex learned by consuming him. A quick search of Raven's computer showed a recent flight with "USAV Smalls" as the destination. The coordinates had been scrubbed from the database, but Alex did find the list of people assigned to that ship.

He tuned into the Blackwatch security band. "Lieutenant General Raven reporting from Charles Airbase, Manhattan. Passcode three-niner-zero-Hotel-Oscar-Papa-Echo, priority Temple-One."

"Passcode confirmed, I read you five-by-five, what is the situation General?"

"Wanna report a possibly compromised individual, a uh, Abal Ammash," Alex said, having picked a name at random from the Smalls roster. "Do you know the location of the suspect?" 

"Dr. Ammash? She, er." There was a short pause, and then, "Current assignment is research and intel, aboard USAV General Robert Smalls."

"And where is that ship now?" Alex asked, putting a demanding snap into Raven's voice. "Dr. Ammash is suspected to be colluding with overseas bio-terrorists! I need current coordinates, this is again priority Temple-One!"

The man on the other end gave him a string of numbers.

"Received, thank you, all clear." Alex disconnected and grinned wide. "We're on the way, Deon," he whispered, returning to liquid form and flowing back outside.

 

* * *

 

The sun had set by the time they'd gotten in the air, and the helicopter was decently disguised against the night sky. Alex kept watch with thermal vision, and once they were close enough over the ship that he could make out figures inside, he handed off the controls to Harlan.

"Where should I land?" Harlan asked.

"Don't land," Alex said.

"What?"

"Stay up at this height, where they can't detect-."

"We're like two thousand feet up! How're we gonna do shit from here?"

"You can come down once I give the signal." Alex then flung himself out of the helicopter.

Harlan grumbled. "This guy, I swear to God."

 

* * *

 

Air whizzed past him for thirteen seconds before he slammed through the top deck. And the deck below that. A second later, he'd turned himself liquid again to spread out the force and slow his momentum.

The radio transciever was smashed to bits by the impact, particles freefloating in with the rest of his body. Of course he could use those bits to reform it, but that was definitely not a priority right now.

 

* * *

 

"Fuck!" Dr. Ammash clanged her fist against the doorframe. "It's been this long and we still haven't learned **anything** useful! Not even that softy approach Collins uses is getting results!" 

"Then it's time we went for a hard approach," Dr. Brooks said. "In fact we should have gone hard in the first place."

"He doesn't even eat apparently! What makes you think he'll feel pain?"

"It expresses discomfort at injections, remember. We just need to-"

The two doctors looked up at a sudden raucous sound of tearing metal, followed by a grotesque _splat_ like a giant egg splitting onto a floor.

Inside the containment cell, Collins heard it too, and it made him drop the bag of cheerios he'd been feeding to Deon and quickly grab his gun back up. 

"I _told you_ ," Deon said with sparkles in his eyes. "I _told you_ Dad and Daddy would come for me."

"Um?! You sure that's them?"

"I'm sure! Don't shoot them when they get to you, okay?"

"I..." Another metallic uproar interrupted while Collins was weighing whether he should promise that or not. Then a yell, powerful and ragged and raw, shook through the walls.

**"I'M COMING FOR YOU DEON!"**

"Dad!" Deon called happily.

Collins heard many stomping clomping footsteps, like a raging elephant and ten men hunting it.

 

* * *

 

It had been so long since something like this, since the last time Alex had faced off against a bevy of soldiers. In a way, it was invigorating. But his excitement was tempered by the fact that he wasn't just fighting for himself this time. Deon's life and happiness were at stake as well.

The soldiers who'd gathered to try and defend the ship from his incursion weren't rookies, but for all their combat experience, they weren't used to facing such an inhuman enemy as _Nigraluciviridae_ (though in principle that was Blackwatch's entire raison d'être). Alex formed a long vine and swept it under the feet of one group, tripping them backwards onto their butts, and following it up with a blast of solid matter to crush them flat.

Was it more brutal than necessary? He didn't care.

A second group of soldiers launched a volley of grenades, and Alex scoffed, growing his shield wide enough to bounce them all back. The enemy scattered to avoid being exploded, but the corridor was small and crowded with people, and soon crowded with smoke and flames too. The soldiers who weren't killed had feet blasted off and eyes blinded.

" **Da-ad!** "

Deon's voice came, semi-muddled, through the confusion of battle-noise. Alex roared a nonwordal answer and charged down the hall, bowling over the remaining soldiers in his path. Two of them he consumed to restore bodily integrity and learn the layout of the ship. _a lab- Brooks- X539- Ammash- interrogation- Collins- Deon! My child!_

He roared again and barreled onward, down the stairs, consuming another soldier to get him out of the way without even stopping.

_Deon my child my CHILD MY CHILD OUR CHILD OUR DEON-_

He skidded to a halt outside a large glass window. _There there our child our child our_ "Deon!"

"Dad!"

Alex hammered on the glass- one, two, three times, and small cracks were starting to form, slowly, slowly, too slowly!

Collins rushed to open the door. "Alex, here!"

Alex snarled and whipped a fist at the soldier interrupting him.

Collins jumped backwards out of the way just as the door was pulverized by a tree-trunk-sized bolt of biomass.

"No dad, he's good!" Deon yelped. "He's a good guy!"

Alex grunted. "What do you mean?"

"He gives me food, and he believes what I say, and- and he follows the Creed!"

"Creed, what?" Collins asked, giving Deon a quick squinty look.

"Please don't hurt him!" Deon continued. "Maybe we can take him to join us!"

Alex grunted again. He morphed away his armor and went through the door, frowning unsure at the man before him, looking in his eyes for any hint of his nature. After a few moments, he gave an order: "Free my son."

"I would free him in a heartbeat," Collins said sincerely, "but I need the key."

Alex's eyes flickered and then his armor slid back into place.

_key- key- to free him- location- armory- deck B-_

He turned and stomped out the door.

 

* * *

 

Major Kassir was in the armory right now, collecting materials for a wild plan. A plan to weaponize a dose of X539 to the attacking virus, rendering it unable to change its form. And then- then that would be it, they could finally contain Blacklight, finally after all these years.

He had one canister filled with liquid explosive, and a larger canister he'd filled with X539. Carefully he affixed the smaller to the inside of the larger, and then set about attaching a detonator to the outside.

He'd only just finished closing up the device's lid when there came a screeching ripping metal sound again. He looked up, into the face of Zeus, cold and matte black ridges.

Zeus made a tyrannical sound at the sight of the Major, but instead of attacking, he strode past him and went to a lockbox in the corner, tearing it open as easily as he'd done with the armory door.

Kassir took this blessed chance and flicked the detonator switch. "Die, you sonofabitch!" He threw the device at Zeus' back and ran for cover.

There was an explosion, then Zeus screamed, louder than Kassir thought possible, and he had to cover his ears as he peeked out to see the results.

A large portion of black viral armor had been peeled away, showing ragged pink flesh over Zeus' back and thighs. The virus-man spun around, eyes blazing red, snarling, "What did you do?!"

Kassir just laughed in his face.

He might or might not have avoided death by not laughing. The world will never know.

 

* * *

 

Consuming Kassir made Alex feel a bit better emotionally, if not physically. Whatever was in that bomb was affecting his body, and he didn't like it one bit. A rush of memory from the Major hit him full-blast, and he fell to his hands and knees, shuddering as pieces of broken speech played across his mind.

_"Experimental Compound X539"... "a fuckin' breakthrough, if we ever manage to get close enough to use it" ... "Miss Abal, you're a damn genius!" ... "shuts down signaling pathways related to shapeshifting functions-"_

That was enough. He spat a string of curses and mentally shoved the rest of John Kassir away in a file drawer. The key to Deon's freedom lay on the floor still. He grabbed it and stood up, face contorting as he realized his armor was compromised. "GrrraaAAAGH!" he roared at the ceiling. With a very concerted effort he found the fragmented electronic parts inside himself and (just barely, as the X539 kicked into full effect) managed to form them into a shitty short-range radio.

"Arend, Harlan."

"We're still up here, li'l guy. What's the sitch?"

He looked at his hand and tried forming claws. The fingers only twitched. "I... might be needing your help."

 

* * *

 

Harlan didn't ask for many details since Alex wasn't offering them, so he just dropped the helo down to the ship's landing pad. There were no personnel on deck as they got out and scouted around. A large jagged hole declared where Alex had made his grand entrance.

"Sounds... pretty quiet," Arend observed, swinging the flashlight of his gun barrel over the area. "Maybe he doesn't need our help after all?"

"Or maybe it's like they say in the movies: _too quiet_." Harlan found a place on the hole's edge that wasn't sharp as shit, and grabbed hold of it to climb down. "So don't let your guard down yet."

 

* * *

 

Alex trudged through the halls, keeping an eagle eye out for any soldiers. Would the X539 prevent healing if he was shot? He didn't know. It was certainly preventing him regrowing the armor plating over the area where Kassir's bomb landed.

He clutched the key like a lifeline. "Collins," he hissed under his breath. "Take him to join us, psh. A Blackwatch, joining _us_. Really." A cynical laugh scraped up out of his throat.

A shuffling sound from his left put him on edge, and he stopped to look. It was the laboratory.

 

* * *

 

The doctors Ammash and Brooks had huddled in the lab, as racks of equipment flew off the shelves and shattered on the floor. But now the screams and noise had died down, and they didn't know what to do from this point on.

Dr. Ammash was the first to stand up, and she went toward the door and began to open it.

That was her accidental undoing, for Alex was nervous and volatile, and he grabbed hold of her arm and flung her down the hallway before he realized she wasn't outfitted in soldier's gear.

Dr. Brooks scuttled back until she was up against the wall. "Zeus, please..."

Alex shifted his gaze slowly from Dr. Ammash's body to Dr. Brooks. "Please what?"

There was much more feeling in the virus' voice than she thought there would be. It sounded so real, so exhausted. She stood up straighter to contradict her own feelings. "What do you want?" she asked boldly.

"I want my son," Alex said. "I want to get my son and go home."

Dr. Brooks bared her teeth suddenly. "You killed my son! And hundreds of other sons, I'm sure! By what right do you deserve a son of your own?"

The virus seemed to sigh. "Your son was enlisted in Blackwatch to fight against me-"

"My son was FIVE!" she yelled. "He was on the playground! March first, two thousand and nine! I'll never forget that day!" The virus stepped back. It stammered. It actually stammered. Dr. Brooks couldn't hear it clearly. "What? What's your excuse?" she demanded.

"I am sorry," the virus said. "I remember that day. I have no excuse.... I was reckless. I am sorry." It extended a hand.

Dr. Brooks did not opt to take the hand.

"Deon cannot replace your son, though. I am here to take Deon back."

Dr. Brooks scowled. "Why not just have another virus child?" she asked sardonically. "Why not have twenty, or a hundred, so your family-hive-group can infect and kill the whole world?"

Alex smashed his hand on the counter, leaving a deep dent. "Deon is not... replaceable," he said, shaking with anger. "And we do not _want_ to infect and kill the whole world, or even most of it." He breathed carefully and turned to leave the lab.

"Don't fucking leave me here!" Dr. Brooks called after him. "The whole ship slaughtered and me left alive and well!? Never in a million years will they believe I wasn't behind this attack!"

Alex stopped. "...I can slaughter you too, if that's what you're asking for."

Dr. Brooks inhaled deeply. She pondered. And as she was pondering she saw a syringe of X539, miraculously unbroken, on the floor amongst much debris. She slowly bent to pick it up.

"Don't bother. I already got a megadose."

She looked up again and noticed now the missing swath of armor.

Alex turned back to her. "I'll leave you alive so you can tell Blackwatch that... I'm just trying to protect my family."

"They will not fucking believe that! Like I said, never in a million years!"

Alex stepped closer, about to say something, but then shook his head and just took the X539 from her. He broke the syringe open over a sink, watching the translucent orange liquid flow away. "Dr. Ammash is quite injured. Because I acted too hastily. You should go and tend to her." He tossed the broken syringe in a bin and left the room without waiting for a response.

He passed Dr. Ammash herself, bruised and bleeding. When he squatted down to check that she was still alive, she tried to scramble away, but her broken arm buckled under her weight and she fell on her face.

"Stop, you'll hurt yourself more," Alex said. He took her arm and felt for the fracture. "I am sorry. I thought you were a soldier."

She screamed, whether in pain or fear or anger, Alex didn't know.

Footsteps rushed toward him in answer to the scream. He looked up to see Arend and Harlan coming around a corner.

"Can you help? Her arm is broken, and possibly skull fractured too," Alex said, standing up.

"She Blackwatch?" Arend asked.

"Yeah, but scientist, not soldier."

"That doesn't make her innocent."

"Look, just help her," Alex said, stomping off. "I'm going back to Deon."

He met Spc. Collins at the door of the containment cell. (Well, at the entryway, since he'd destroyed the door.) "Was that Dr. Ammash screaming?" the soldier asked, looking over Alex's head to see what he could see.

"Yeah, it was, I fucked up," Alex said, "but maybe she deserves some pain for inventing those cruel chemicals."

"Dad!"

Alex pushed past Collins and pulled out the hard-won key. "We'll have you out in just a moment," he said, crouching to find the spot where the restraints were locked from.

"Dad, you're hurt!"

"I'll be okay, don't worry, it's just- There!" The metal bands on Deon's legs snapped open with a _clang_. Alex moved to the arm bands. "Hey," he said, softer now, so only Deon's ever-sharp ears would hear. "Do you really want this guy to come join us? Do you really think that's a good idea?"

"It's a good idea. He's good. He's not a Templar, and he doesn't hurt innocents, and- and..." Deon took a bit to puzzle out the rest of the sentence. "...and you can teach him all the rest, all the rest of how to be an Assassin."

The arm bands clanged open. Alex couldn't form claws, but he pulled at the remaining cloth restraints with raw strength until they tore enough that Deon could slip free. "There." He pulled the boy into a hug. "I've got you. You're safe."

They held the hug for perhaps a whole minute, until Harlan and Arend came trotting into the room. "The doctor's stable, and- Shit!"

There was a great double _thud_ , and Alex turned around to see Harlan and Arend holding Collins on the floor.

"Alex, I thought you took out all the soldiers!"

Alex squared his shoulders. "Deon requested we let this one live."

Harlan struggled with this a moment. "What makes this one special?"

A dialogue fragment from Kassir's memory floated through Alex's consciousness.

_"I worry you're getting too friendly with him, Collins."_

_"You figure I should treat him bad just on account of who his dad is? You don't even wanna give him a chance!"_

_"Watch your tongue! You're on thin ice; I could court-martial you already for not telling us about this kid sooner."_

"Alex? Alex?"

Alex forced himself back into the present moment. "Let him up," he said, nudging Harlan and Arend to get off of Collins. "Deon might not even be alive if not for him."

Collins sat up and adjusted his glasses. "Thanks, but... is there a way you can cover up that I helped you free him? If they find that out, I'm definitely getting court-martialed."

A thin grin spread over Alex's face. "They can't court-martial you if they can't find you."

"Uh, what?" Arend asked.

"He's coming with us. Deon says this guy's got the makings of a future Assassin. I figure I'll give him a chance."


	16. Return, Recruit, and Reminiscence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the Drama™ is finally over... or is it?

Deon was immensely glad to be out of the restraints, and he wouldn't let go of Alex for the whole duration of their helicopter ride back. With one hand, he held tight to his dad, and with the other he continuously played with a long lock of his own hair.

"You'll tangle up if you keep doing that," Alex said.

Deon paused his fidgeting for a bit, but he started up a bit later. It seemed to be his comfort mechanism, so Alex decided not to bother him about it any further.

Fred was mostly quiet during the trip, other than asking a few questions. Like, "Where we headed?"

"Manhattan!" Harlan yelled over the rushing roar of helicopter blades.

"What happens once we get there?"

"Gotta present you to Bill for his approval! He's our head honcho!" 

"...And if he doesn't approve?"

"Eh, well he might kill ya!" Harlan turned back to check Fred's reaction.

Fred looked suitably unsettled.

Harlan laughed heartily. "Just a li'l joke there, sorry! Most likely it'll be fine! After all, you got his son-in-law and grandson vouchin' for ya!"

 

* * *

 

Desmond nearly fell on his face rushing to the entryway when he heard the group's footsteps. And, thank the stars above, Deon was among the group that met him there. Desmond whooped a great shout of joy and ran forward.

"Daddy!" Deon called out, and ran forward too.

Desmond tried to scoop him up into a hug, but a slash of pain in his ribs cut that plan short as soon as he'd begun to lift. "Sh-" He bit back the swear and settled for just hugging Deon without picking him up. (He'd been so excited that he'd forgotten the kid's weight was hard to lift at the best of times, never mind with an injury.)

"I love you, Daddy."

"Love you too, oh my god, you're home, you're home, you're safe at home now," he said, tears coming to his eyes. "I'm so glad you're home."

"Me too, I'm glad too." Deon wriggled out of the hug and grinned up at Desmond and the other Assassins who'd come to greet them. "Look, I... I brought a new friend," he said, pointing over at Fred.

William had noticed the new friend, and the new friend's uniform. "A Blackwatch soldier," he said flatly.

"He helped Deon," Alex said, "so Deon wants him to be our newest recruit."

Out of habit, Fred saluted, although a moment later he was unsure if that helped his case or not. "Frederick Collins, sir. Formerly Specialist, US Army, Blackwatch division."

William tilted his head. "Formerly? Is that right?"

"Couldn't exactly turn in my formal resignation papers, but I think I left that career path all back on the half-destroyed ship."

That earned a low chuckle from the lead Assassin. "All right then. I'll trust the judgement of my men. And my boy," he added with a fond stroke on the top of Deon's head.

Desmond had now gone over to give Alex a welcome-back hug. But soon he let out a yelp of surprise. "What th- Turn around, oh my god, what happened to you?"

Alex tried again to morph a fresh layer over the raw wound on his back. Nothing doing. "They... hit me with something. Chemical."

"Compound X539," Fred elucidated. "Designed as a kill-switch for most of Blacklight's abilities."

"Kill switch!?" Desmond shrieked. "Alex, please tell me you're-"

"I'm fine," Alex said, "I just can't do any shapeshifting."

"Ever?!?"

"No, it's temporary," Fred answered for him.

"It _usually_ is," Alex said tersely, "but I got about a hundred times the standard dose."

Desmond breathed in sharply. "Well fuck."

Alex gave him a look. "It's not the end of the world. You can't shapeshift either, and you do just fine."

Desmond laughed a very weak laugh. "I, uh... I guess we'll just wait and see, then."

 

* * *

 

Alex took Deon down to the medical wing so Ragland could make sure the boy was all right after his ordeal. Desmond volunteered to show Fred around the place... plus keep an eye on him just in case.

"So you're the 'Miles' in Deon Mercer-Miles," Fred said as they strolled down the hall.

Desmond looked over at him with a little smile. "Yeah, and? You got an issue with gayness?"

"The, uh, scientists were trying to track down... well, obviously Alex is his genetic father, but they wanted to track down the genetic mother."

Desmond's smile became a smirk. "Doesn't have one."

"...How does he not-"

"We're both his genetic fathers."

"What?"

Desmond laughed and gave a little shrug. "It's Blacklight, man! Y'know, the virus that's super good at combining DNA and gettin' creative with it?"

Fred looked like he was maybe starting to get an inkling of what Desmond meant. Maybe. But only the start of an inkling.

"Look, I'll come right out and say it: I, uh, got him preggo." Desmond coughed and laughed again. "Surprised the hell out of everyone, including him!"

Fred scratched the side of his face and said, "Wow."

"Yeah, it was a real 'wow' time all around." Desmond sighed contentedly, thinking back on their whirlwind courtship. "But hey, 'wow' is kinda normal when you're in the Assassins."

"Assassins," Fred repeated. "What exactly is that? A codename for this, thing you're a part of?"

"Not a codename, our actual name," Desmond said, just as they happened to come by the armory. He unlatched the door and took a Hidden Blade from the wall of weapons. "It's kinda part of what we do. But not just like hitmen or mercenaries; we've got principles and structure." He showed Fred the stylized "A" symbol embossed on the blade's housing. "The Assassin's Creed. Ever heard of it?"

Fred leaned in to peer at it. "No, I for sure haven't. Not before today."

"Heh, well then, we're doing a good job keeping it secret." Desmond put the blade away. "I guess only the higher-up Blackwatches are allowed to know about us." He reached out and shook Fred's hand. "Okay, then let me unofficially welcome you as the newest member of the Manhattan Den of the Assassin Brotherhood."

 

* * *

 

Deon was given a clean bill of health by Dr. Ragland, who then took some time examining Alex's back. "Hmm. Mm."

The chemical splash had covered nearly two square feet of his surface area, eating away that swath of skin like a plough tearing wide and shallow across a farmfield.

"Should we be concerned? That it won't ever heal?" Alex asked as he was prodded with gloved fingers.

Ragland mmed again. "Well... if you haven't begun to heal in the next day or so, I can try to graft on some tissue from Deon."

"A graft-on from De-on," Deon said cheerily, swinging his legs back and forth from his seat.

"Right on," Ragland chuckled.

Alex ground his jaw. "But he's a small child. It won't be good to take from his growing body."

"Who's the doctor here, you or me?" Ragland snapped his gloves off and dropped them in the waste bin. "And that fact that he's still growing means he'd likely recover faster from donating tissue."

Alex got up and went over to lift Deon into a hug. "Don't want to do that unless we have to," he rumbled softly.

"Well it just may turn out to be your only option."

He shook his head. "I could survive like this, if I had to."

"Daaad, come on, don't you wanna get all better? So you can go out and fight bad guys?" Deon formed little claw-fingers and went "Raaar" to demonstrate.

Alex smiled. "Just been doing that for two missions in a row, kid. I can stand to take a sabbatical."

"What's a sabbatical?"

"A well-earned vacation. Some quality time at home." Alex nodded goodbye to Dr. Ragland and left for their apartment.

 

* * *

 

Desmond pointed to the stairwell. "Up there's the residences. Seven singles, four family suites. ...You don't have any family coming here with you, right?" he asked, and hoped the question didn't come off as callous.

Fred exhaled. "They're all either dead or moved far away."

"Aw, sorry."

"No need for that," Fred said. "It is how it is."

Desmond did wonder whether they'd died of Blacklight-related causes or something else, but he knew better than to ask. At least, not now when he barely knew the guy. "Well, uh." He turned around and pointed down another hall. "The medical wing's that way; we got a nurse practitioner, Paul, and an MD, Dr. Ragland."

"I know him," Fred said, brightening a little. "Ol' Braddy and me were college buddies way back when. I had to drop out to help Mama with stuff, but we wrote back and forth for a while after that. Haven't heard from him since I got into Blackwatch. Oh! There he is!"

Dr. Ragland had followed Alex and Deon out to the hall, and he was in the middle of starting to say something to Alex when he noticed the man in the Blackwatch uniform. "Desmond, what, who-"

"You don't recognize me?" Fred said with a smile. "I haven't gotten all that old, have I?"

Dr. Ragland blinked at the name tag. "Collins? Fred Collins?"

"Yup," said Alex. "Collins has decided to... jump ship from Blackwatch." He gave a little grin, proud of his subtle wordplay.

"Don't know about 'decided'," Fred shrugged. "Frankly, I don't think they'd want me staying on, seeing as how I aided and abetted Deon's escape."

"It was the right thing to do, man," Desmond said, patting Fred's back appreciatively. Then he turned to the doctor. "So, Doc, are my two favorite guys gonna be all right?"

"Deon's fine; about as healthy as ever," Ragland said. "And in Alex's case, it's wait and see. Looks like he's going to be joining you in taking it slow for a while to recover."

" **Try** and recover," Alex muttered, looking away.

Desmond put a hand on his shoulder, and they exchanged a silent, comforting look into each other's eyes.

 

* * *

 

"How did you find each other?" Deon asked out of the blue the next day, as Desmond was eating lunch and Alex was folding clothes.

"Hm?" Desmond said through a mouthful of sandwich.

Deon put down the tablet he'd been scanning news headlines from. "Like... you're married now, but what was... what about before?"

"We were dating," Alex mumbled, almost like he was shy. "And then you happened. And we realized we were in love."

"But what about even... even more before?"

Desmond finished the last bite of his sandwich and pushed his plate away. "Hm. First time we met... Well, it seems like forever ago now, but it's only been about three, four years. You remember, right Alex?"

"Of course." Alex folded the last pair of jeans and placed it in the hamper. "We- Dana and me- we'd been out on our own for a long while, basically ever since I... since the Blacklight event started in 2009." He was silent for a bit, thinking back on those frantic times.

"We met in 2013," Desmond continued when he realized Alex was lost in thought. "Cause after the 2012 thing went down I told Dad I wanted to help strengthen up the Brotherhood. Crafted this big plan for a base near my old stomping grounds in Brooklyn, but there were too many bad memories there, so I changed my mind and aimed for Manhattan instead."

Alex said, "That explains how we never ran across you in previous years."

Desmond smiled. "Dad was like, 'Are you aware that island is sort of a war zone, still reeling from a military disaster?' And I was like, 'Guess they need our help pretty bad then!'"

"Blacklight was close to finding out the location we were staying," Alex said, gazing into the middle distance. "So we had to bite the bullet and find another place."

Deon hopped over in front of him. "Why did you have to bite a bullet? I bet it tastes gross!"

"Oh. It's- it's not literal. It means we had to stop procrastinating, and make a move."

"Huh," Deon said, filing this new information away in his mind.

"So you two were I guess scouting around the city just randomly-"

Alex interrupted Desmond. "Not randomly. We had specific search parameters."

"Arright, my bad," Desmond said, holding his hand up. "You were scouting around within specific search parameters, and I spotted you through the binoculars and I was like, 'shit, that guy can run like a motherfu-'" He barely caught himself before saying the entire swear in front of Deon. "Like a marathonner," he revised. "So I figured he'd be a great recruit, so I ran out and found him and said 'hey you wanna join this thing, we fight abuses of power and stuff', and whattaya know, he was up for it!"

"Yeah!" Deon pumped a fist. "Go go, fight the power!"

Alex smirked. "And you didn't realize I was a virus- **the** virus- until you presented me to your fellow Assassins and they recognized me."

Desmond rubbed his head sheepishly. "Yeah... I mean, maybe I'd seen you on the news back when I was in Brooklyn, but I guess I forgot. Dunno if I can blame that on the Bleeding Effect stuff or not."

"Luckily," Alex continued, still with a big smile, "William was reasonable enough to allow me and Dana sanctuary, once he saw I was not a threat to his group."

"Yeah, and then Dad was like, 'Desmond, you found him, I'm making you responsible for his training'," Desmond said, doing a half-decent impression of how William talked. "'Make sure he follows the Creed, I don't want to regret allowing him in.'"

"And the rest is history." Alex pulled Deon into his lap. "We started spending time together, and Desmond thought I looked so good; he couldn't resist me. I didn't understand at first, but later I started to feel the same way."

Deon looked at Desmond, who was coming over to sit beside them. "What does that mean, you couldn't resist?"

"I uh. Well, this only happens when you're more grown up, but like- when you see certain people, you feel attracted to them. And you wanna, well, go on dates and kiss and touch them a lot."

"And possibly have sex," Alex added.

A flash of recognition lit up in Deon's eyes. "Oh, sex, okay!" He didn't exactly know the detailed mechanics of sex, but he was vaguely aware of some aspects of the concept.

"I always forget that he knows what that is," Desmond whispered into Alex's ear.

"He reads biology journals, of course he knows," Alex whispered back.

"So you saw each other and you fell in love!" Deon declared, grinning smartly.

Desmond snickered. "It wasn't exactly that instantaneous."

Alex nodded. "Love usually takes time."

"Oh, okay. But it- it's still amazing, though!" Deon said. "W... with how... there's so many people alive, it's something like.... seven... point four billion... but you still found the right person to fall in love with! And Harlan and Arend... they're not even... from the same continent, and they found each other too!"

Desmond thought a moment. "Well, I'm sure there's other guys in that 7.4 billion I would have been happy marrying, if I hadn't found Alex. But I **am** really glad that we ended up together." He wrapped Deon and Alex in a big hug.

"I'm really glad too!" Deon laughed. "Or else I wouldn't exist!"


	17. Rest & Recuperation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> hope you like short smuts

Deon had eaten a big dinner, and that probably contributed to him conking out to sleep real quick while reading. Alex picked him up from the beanbag and moved him into his bed. (It had been nearly two years since he'd last been able to fit in that crib Rebecca picked out so long ago. Now he slept in his own room, in a twin-size bed. The sleek black crib stood in a corner of Alex and Desmond's room, and they used it for hanging clothes on.)

"You wanna go for a walk?" Desmond asked.

Alex tucked the sheets around Deon neatly, then turned to Desmond. "A walk? Where to?"

Desmond would've shrugged, but his injury was still limiting what motions his shoulders could comfortably make. "Just around the block, I was thinking. It's a nice night out."

Alex was agreeable to this. A few minutes later they were out under the evening sky, hand-in-hand, enjoying their solitude together.

"Thanks for bringing Deon back."

"You've thanked me already," Alex said, giving Desmond's hand a squeeze.

Desmond squeezed back. "I can't thank you enough. You went out there and risked your life-"

"He's my son too," Alex said intensely. "And you risked your life first."

"All right, all right." Desmond leaned in and brushed his lips against Alex's cheek. "Love you. So much."

On instinct Alex looked around to check nobody was nearby, but this only took him a moment before he turned to Desmond and kissed him back.

Desmond took him by the back of the head, enjoying the feel of his soft flowing hair at the same time as his soft yearning lips. The wind was gentle, passing over the couple without comment, full of the smell of mid-October.

Desmond pulled out of the kiss and smiled. "I can't say it enough. Thank you. I love you."

"I know." Alex brushed off a leaf that had fallen on Desmond's hair during their kiss. Then he let his hand fall slowly down, stopping on Desmond's chest, putting the other around his hip. "Des... do you..." The rest of his sentence was a very low mumble.

"Say again?" Desmond asked, leaning in closer to try and catch Alex's quiet words.

"Do you still... want another kid?"

Desmond let out a small chuckle. "You haven't forgotten. Yeah, I do still want that. Are you thinking of letting it happen again?"

"Might not be able to, now," Alex said, looking away. "If the X539 has shut off everything except for my basic existence."

Desmond stroked Alex's head again. "Try and be optimistic. You might still get all your abilities back, with time."

"But I might not. It's entirely possible that I could wait and wait and never get them back. And if I can't make claws or tendrils or _my own goddamn skin_ then I sure can't make a goddamn kid." A frown was growing over Alex's face and he was starting to shake.

"Alex, please." Desmond pulled him into a tighter hug. He could feel the rough divot of the wound on Alex's back, but he didn't shy away from it. "Listen, it's fine if you can't have kids anymore. It's _fine_. I'd be a shitty husband if I left you for something like that."

"B-but you want another kid."

"We can't always get what we want."

Alex breathed and relaxed in Desmond's soothing grip. They stayed there like that for a long minute. A crow cawed.

"But if we try sometimes," Alex finally said, "we just might find, we get what we need?"

"Aw yeah." Desmond chuckled again.

"I want to kiss you again," Alex said, walking forward a few steps in the hug, and suddenly Desmond's back was against the brick wall. "Can I get that? Can I kiss you, right here?"

"Yeah, definitely."

Alex made a heavy rumbling noise, that reminded Desmond of the first time he'd started up his old motorcycle, and moved in to lock lips while firmly gripping his hands.

Desmond took his hands eagerly. Now they could make love for real, not like the ploy before when he was trying to put off telling what had happened to Deon. Now there was no pretense between them, no guilt or worry. Just pure affection and attraction, expressed with wandering tongues and hot breaths and pounding heartbeats.

"I'm sorry," Desmond said, when next his mouth was free.

Alex managed a slurred "Wha?"

"Last time, when Deon was gone, I'm sorry."

"You're forgiven." Alex squeezed his hands quickly before letting go and pressing up under Desmond's shirt. "Just don't do that kind of shit to me again." He hummed a short weird melody as he unbuttoned the fabric barrier between himself and his lover-partner-husband.

Desmond moaned, grateful for the support of the wall behind him as Alex mouthed wetly down his neck and one side of his chest, mindfully avoiding the bandaged areas. "Aah, Alex... so good."

Alex rumbled again, and slid one hand below Desmond's waistband. "This good too?" he asked, working his fingers on the stiffening shaft.

"Mm, fuck- lemme just-" Desmond scuffled his pants down. "Lucky there's no one out here but us, so go ahead you filthy sweetheart."

Alex grinned, bright teeth catching moonrays, and he looked so handsome that Desmond couldn't help but pull him in for another long kiss. Multitasking, the virus-man kept up his hand motions while still doing plenty with his lips and tongue. Desmond was soon thrusting into Alex's hand, his hot flesh pilled with sweat in the cool night breeze.

"At least these abilities, I still have," Alex said. "The abilities to give you bodily pleasure."

"Mmfuck yeah," Desmond gasped. "Y- you wanna suck me off? Cause I'm, oh, I'm about to hit the edge soon."

Fluidly, Alex moved into a crouch and let Desmond thrust into his mouth as roughly as he needed to. The taste and texture and heat of his husband's aroused penis never ceased to fascinate him, especially when it was in frantic motion and _oh! yes! this is it!_ Alex moaned in delight at the peristaltic muscle movements and the thick wet spurts.

Slowly the couple slumped into a tingling heap on the ground, both of them panting heavily.

Alex disengaged from Desmond's crotch. "...We should go back inside."

"Hhyeah," Desmond breathed. "And then I should get you off too."

Alex flushed pink and started to rebutton Desmond's shirt. "Thanks for the offer, but I'm good."

"Next time?"

"Maybe next time." Alex kissed Desmond's bandaged shoulder lightly.

After getting up and getting his pants back on, Desmond asked, "D'you think you maybe, uh, got pregnant just now?"

Alex snorted. "You have goddamn baby fever. Is that why you asked me to suck you?"

"Hey, I wasn't thinking about that in the moment!" Desmond said with a laugh as they began heading back home. "But you're avoiding the question, man. Do you think you're-"

"Highly doubt it. But I do feel much better now." Alex slung an arm around Desmond's torso to draw him close, to share in his loving warmth.

"Ah well.... We could always adopt."

"I doubt we'd pass any agency's background check."

"Buzzkill." Desmond purposely stepped on Alex's toe.

"Ow, my human pain receptors."


	18. what's up people? by maximum the hormone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> i should/should not be allowed to name chapters after being awake this many consecutive hours - vote now on your phones
> 
> this chapter fuckin' short. oh well, they were short in the start too, remember?

The cafeteria was big enough that mealtimes never got too crowded. But still, people usually liked to bunch together and be sociable. Today, as expected, almost everyone was seated around the newcomer, the first Blackwatch soldier to ever join their crew.

Fred pointed across the table at Desmond and Alex, and said, "So you're married," then moved to gesture to Harlan and Arend, "and you're married," then over to Dana and Rebecca, "and you're dating."

As he spoke, everyone who he'd indicated nodded in turn.

Fred looked a bit mystified. "Dang." 

"You got some problem with our relationships?" Harlan said, leaning one beefy arm onto the table.

"Oh no, I got no problem," Fred said quickly. "I'm the last person that would have a problem. But like... Are Bill and Janet the only people 'round here that aren't gay?"

Rebecca raised her hand. "I'm bisexual."

"And I'm... not entirely sure," Alex said tentatively. Desmond put an arm around his shoulders.

Fred gave him a little smile. "Well, I'm not entirely sure for myself either."

"That's fine, we're cool with whatever you are," Arend said, "just so long as you're not a Templar."

"Aw, hey." Dana smirked at Arend. "Don't you know there's been many cases of Templars changing sides for the sake of love?"

"Well then they weren't Templars anymore, huh?" Arend retorted with a grin.

Dana rolled her eyes and returned to eating.

* * *

After lunch Desmond took Fred out to get clothes and such, since he'd had to leave the ship in a hurry, taking almost nothing with him. Desmond handed him some cash and kept an eagle (vision) eye out for trouble while Fred poked around Goodwill.

"Don't use your military discount," Desmond said when they got in line for checkout. "Then you'd have to show your ID; people could already be looking for-"

"Yeah, I got it, I'm not completely dense, kid." Obviously, it was important that Blackwatch continue believing he had perished at the hand of Zeus.

He paid for the bag of clothes and they started home. On the way, he noticed Desmond kept glancing up at the rooftops.

"Something going on?"

"Oh nothing." Desmond shook his head. "Just thinking how it's been a while since I walked on the streets this long. Usually I'm up there." He indicated the roofs with another glance. "Faster, safer. You don't parkour, do you?"

"Parkour? Uh- like on Youtube? Those wacky running tricks like something out of a movie?"

Desmond smiled. "Something like that."

"No, I- you may have noticed I'm kind of a bigger guy. Even being in the military didn't completely change that."

"Hey, I'm a bit of a chubster too, and I rock the parkour nevertheless." Desmond patted his shoulder. "Don't worry, we'll start your training off easy."

* * *

They returned to the base as the sun approached high noon. Deon was playing in the fenced yard, running around carefree with Jamie and Harlan.

"Deon's a good kid," Fred commented, watching him toss a well-chewed frisbee to the dog.

"Hell yeah, he's a great kid," Desmond said, a bit of a sting in his voice. "And your guys really had him bolted to a table like some soulless criminal."

"He is a bioweapon, after all, like his father."

"He's only half-bioweapon," Desmond countered easily. "And irregardless, he doesn't ever use his powers for violence."

"They didn't know that," Fred said. "They don't know that Blacklight can be so... human."

"Being human isn't the point. I've met lots of real asshole humans."

"All right, 'human' was a bad choice of words. I shoulda said like, friendly." Fred gestured at Deon's innocent play. The kid had abandoned the frisbee now and had grown his hair out into long shaggy tendrils to mimic Jamie's fur as they ran around the yard. "Look, I'll be totally honest, it's disturbing to see him shapeshift. I'm not used to that. Blackwatch isn't used to that. The whole state of New York associates that with chaos and destruction. It's sort of like... like associating gay guys with disease."

Desmond took a step back. "God... I guess that makes... some amount of sense." He let out a long breath and ran a hand back through his hair. "Well then." He gave Fred a weak smile. "Maybe you can help us think up some advocacy campaign to combat the rampant Blacklight-phobia."

Harlan had overheard, and he snorted a laugh. "You thinkin' like 'He's here, he's a virus, and he'd like to say hello'?"

"Not super catchy," Desmond had to admit. "We'll have to workshop it a bit."


	19. Here I Am

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> p.r. campaigns and fucking in the hall

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we're back to song titles, nice.

Deon had his arms hooked around Alex's neck, both of them forcing a held smile, both of them feeling supremely awkward.

"Look here, look here!" Rebecca said, tapping the yellow octopus toy perched atop Dana's camera. "Deon, kinda lean out a bit? Good, okay now Alex put your head up a little? No not like that- more like, yeah okay exactly! Don't move, hold that face, hold that pose!"

The shutter clicked and the light flashed across them. "Good one, good one," Dana said, thumbs-upping them.

"How many photos do we need?" Alex asked.

"I wanna get like, seven or eight good shots," Dana said, adjusting something for the fortieth time in her camera settings. "Then I'll be able to pick out the absolute best to make prints of."

"And these prints will make people not scared of Blacklight?"

Dana grinned. "If my photojournalism course was worth the money, yeah."

Deon plucked the octopus off the camera. "Can I hold Lemon in one of the shots?"

"Sure thing!" Dana said to him. "I was actually gonna suggest one with you playing together."

"Be nice if Desmond could be in these," Alex muttered.

"I think the campaign of just you and Deon has the best chances," Dana said. "If we put Desmond in, we risk a counter-campaign that goes 'hey that virus is fraternizing with a known killer.'"

"Ha. Am I not a known killer?"

"I told you, your new image is that you don't kill anymore."

"But that's not true."

Dana threw her hands up. "It's called 'spin', Alex, god! You haven't been tearing through the streets, consuming left and right in front of the horrified public, so it's plausible you've been a complete pacifist! You settled down and had a kid and now you're all good, family-friendly!"

"Can't you do that spin for Desmond too?"

"Aw hell, fine," Dana said. "Glad you've got such confidence in me. Bring Des in and I'll get you all three together."

 

* * *

 

"How're you liking your new crib?" Desmond asked.

Fred shrugged. "It's all right. A little sparse, but I'm used to that from the Army."

"Hey, fun fact, you have the room I used to be in, before Alex and I-"

"Daddy!"

Desmond turned around just in time for Deon to crash him against the wall. "Oogf. What's up?"

"You gotta come be in photos, photo shots for Dana's project!"

"Wasn't it gonna just be you two virus guys?"

"Yeah but Dad complained."

"Haha." Desmond shot Fred a smile. "C'mon, Collins, you can help."

"You can call me Fred. And how exactly am I gonna help?"

"Tell us what's the least threatening pose and stuff." Desmond patted him on the back solidly. "As a former Blackwatch, you'll be our window into the minds of the people we wanna convince." 

 

* * *

 

After another half-hour of photography, Dana had the choicest shots done finally. There was a couple of Alex holding Deon lovingly, a couple of Deon and Alex playing with Legos and Play-doh and stuffies, a couple of Alex and Desmond sharing a tender look and touching each other's faces, and a couple of all three of them sat on a couch reading a book. All that needed to be done now was to add text on top (like "Not that different; Not that dangerous", "He's a virus and I love him", "Fighting is over; Family is now", etc.) and then print up a shitload of posters to put around the town.

Desmond pulled off the sweater he'd worn to obscure his tattoo and burn scar (everyone figured it was best that he not be super super recognizable in these pics) and said, "Now I just hope people _believe_ this PR campaign."

"If they don't, it's no big deal," said Alex. "I wasn't planning to run for mayor anytime soon."

Desmond leaned on his shoulder, laughing heartily. "Ohh man! You're getting good at jokes, bae!"

Alex smiled at him. "Living with a silly guy like you, I guess the humor skill rubs off on me."

"Blacklight loves, Blacklight jokes, Blacklight does everything a human can," Fred said. "Really blows my mind. Just like ten days ago I still thought Alex was only capable of combat-type stuff."

Dana gave him a nasty look. "Then why hasn't there been non-stop chaos these past few years, huh? Blackwatch got a fuckin' explanation for that?"

Fred coughed. "We were told that Zeus was... either 'hibernating' or like, 'underground', building up its strength to fuel another big outbreak."

Alex shrugged. "Well. I am 'underground' in a sense. Staying off the radar like a good Assassin."

"You think these posters could work to change Blackwatch's mind?" Desmond asked, gesturing to the laptop where Dana was graphical designing the shit out of a photo.

"Maybe. It's sure worth a shot." He smiled a little. "Sure changed my mind pretty well, seeing him with Deon and Desmond."

"Dad, I'm hungry," Deon said, pulling Alex's arm. "Cafeteria."

Alex hummed and took his hand. "Desmond, are you hungry?"

"Actually, I just had a lunch," Desmond said, patting his stomach. "You guys go eat. I'll take Deon's toys back to the apartment."

 

* * *

 

After gathering up the toys into a cardboard box, Desmond was carrying it all back when he came across Arend and Harlan approaching from the opposite direction. "He-ey. You guys need any help packing up?"

"Oh, change of plans," Arend said. "We decided we like it here, and so we put in for a transfer from Bishop's team to Bill's."

"For a few months, at least," Harlan said. "She seemed a teensy bit offended but hey, we wanted a change of pace." He leaned in to Desmond and spoke a little quieter. "Plus, hubby doesn't like all the travel; he's a bit scared of flying, if you can believe it!"

"I am not 'scared of flying', you dingus," Arend retorted with a raised index finger. "In fact I've skydived out of planes a couple a dozen times! There's a difference between being scared and just plain not liking something."

Harlan gave Arend a smile. "Arright, I get what you mean, babe." He looked over at Desmond again. "So there ya have it; we're staying in Manhattan for the foreseeable future."

"Spend some more quality time with Deon, help you all out with whatever needs doing," Arend said. 

"Cool, cool." Desmond chuckled as he passed them. "Maybe you'll end up starting a family here too, eh?"

"Don't try an' infect us with your baby fever, kid," Harlan called after him.

"I don't have baby fever, geesh."

 

* * *

 

Alex had downed thirty ounces of an ultra-thick protein shake, and was leaning slumped in his seat digesting it, while Deon was putting together a taco salad with help from Kel.

Fred, with a simple tortilla soup bowl, was sat next to Alex. "Do protein shakes really do it for you?" he asked.

"Urhm." Alex moved his head on the table. "So-so. Doesn't have the same all stuff as people have in them, but keeps me running well enough." He lifted his head to look at Fred a moment. "Essentially it's like being vegan."

"Hm."

Alex dropped his head back down.

"Why you tired all the sudden?"

"Body still fucked up from the X539."

"You were fine in the photoshoot though?"

Alex sigh-groaned. "But now I ate. Digestion processes are kicking in full-force. Using lotta energy to repair the massive damage."

"Oh, so you _are_ gonna heal from this... big crater on your back."

"I'm gonna try the fuck out of healing," Alex grumbled into the table. "I can't just do it in a snap like I used to."

There was an undercurrent of anger Fred wasn't sure how to address. He took another spoonful of soup and didn't say anything.

Alex's outer shell around his wound prickled with the activity of cells frantically taking in nutrients and dividing. Frantically, yet still so painfully slow. Like the speed of a _human's_ healing process. "God," he snorted. "Blackwatch may be incompetent in some ways, but they did a helluva job on this chemical."

"I'm sorry," Fred said after a moment.

"Don't," Alex dropped the word heavy and quick. He wasn't looking for any pity or apology. He was just making conversation.

 

* * *

 

Things gradually returned to semi-normal. The den was a bit more crowded now, with Fred and Arend and Harlan staying, but they managed as well as ever. Alex's wound was still giant across his whole back, but close measurements showed the hole was shrinking a tiny tiny bit day by day. Dr. Ragland again brought up the idea of transplanting healthy tissue from Deon, but still Alex didn't want to do that unless really urgently necessary.

The P.R. posters were printed, and scattered across the island: posted up on alley walls and bridge pillars and bus stops and anywhere else they could manage. News media quickly picked up the story ( _Local Virus Comes Out As Gay, Has Adopted Son With Human_ , proclaimed the New York Daily News, and it ticked Alex off to no end what assumptions the writers made.)

"I thought about contacting them," he said to Desmond one night. "To set the record straight."

"If it really matters to you-"

"No." Alex shook his head. "It's too much risk for too little reward." He went back to picking up Deon's mess of toys all over the floor. "The people who matter to me know the truth. That's enough."

"Aw." Desmond smiled and took a bite of the leftover pizza he was having for dinner. "You sure you're not hungry? We've got steak in the fridge."

"No we don't. I ate it earlier."

Desmond let out a soft laugh. "You coulda waited."

"I was too hungry to wait." Alex picked up the couch and made a face at all the dust and debris underneath it.

"Mnm. I kinda thought tonight could be a special couple's night," Desmond said, "since it's just us; we don't have to worry about Deon for once in forever." (Deon was over at Kel's apartment with some of the others for an Xbox night Kel was hosting.)

Alex set the couch down somewhere else and started vigorously sweeping.

Desmond let him go about it for a bit while he finished his meal. As he was putting the dishes in the sink, Alex had just placed the couch back in position on a newly-clean floor. "Alex?"

Alex turned to him.

"Is everything okay? You seem distant."

"I'm not. I'm right here."

"I mean _emotionally_ ," Desmond said, "like, you're not quite the same since rescuing Deon."

"Of course I'm not the same," Alex grumbled at him. "The chemical disabled me. I can't do what I used to do. And I don't like losing abilities."

"Are you depressed about it?"

Alex grunted and shrugged. "Maybe. I dunno. You gonna get me Zoloft or some shit? It probably wouldn't work on me."

"Oh come on." Desmond came over and took hold of his shoulders. "Be straight with me."

Alex snorted. "I'm incapable of being straight."

Desmond exhaled. "Okay. Let's just start this conversation over."

"Know what? I'd love that."

"Good. So, Alex. Are you feeling okay? Emotionally?"

"I'm..." His eyes wandered around the ceiling a bit, before coming back to Desmond's face. "It's an identity crisis, you could say. The X539 took away a lot of what defined me."

"Alex," Desmond said gently, squeezing his shoulders, "Even if that stuff turned you 100% pure human, it wouldn't change how I feel about you. You'd still be my husband, Deon's dad, Dana's brother, and so on."

Alex tossed his head. "Yeah, I know. It feels strange, though. To not be indestructible. Having to... worry about myself. Not just about my family and friends." He smiled a tiny dry smile.

"Welcome to how the rest of the world feels, bae."

Alex hummed and nodded.

Desmond nodded along with him. "So, now that we cleared the air on emotional stuff, are you doing okay bodily-speaking?"

"As okay as you'd expect. Still can't shapeshift, except for tiny bits." He looked at his hand and concentrated. The last joints of his fingertips shakily transformed into blades, each one shorter than half a butter knife.

Desmond halfway smiled. "That's progress."

"Still not back to fighting condition."

"Well forget about fighting for now." Desmond wrapped arms around him and smooched his cheek. "Just chill at home until you're all better." He squeezed him in a little hug. "I'll take care of you real good."

The warmth and tenderness of Desmond's touch radiated across Alex's skin. "You want to... have sex?" he asked, de-blading his fingers as quick as he could.

"Yeah, if you're up for it." Desmond smooched his cheek again, then moved to murmur right into his ear. "I could really go for you topping me tonight."

"I..." Alex closed his eyes. "I can't form a dick."

"You can't what?"

"I've told you, I don't have it formed most of the time," Alex said, rushing the words out. "Certainly didn't have it formed while I was raiding the ship for Deon. And now I can't form-"

"Oh, ohh, right, the anti-shapeshifting- Yeah."

"I tried the other night, and I really-"

"Shh, it's fine. It's totally fine. No dick necessary."

"I should've told you sooner."

"It's fine." Desmond kissed his cool lips.

Alex softened into the kiss, his mind melting, soon finding himself pinned back on the wall with Desmond all around him.

Desmond groped across Alex's chest, fingers pressing down the sides of his torso. "I guess- you can't get naked either, then?"

A ripple of pale color passed over Alex's clothes. "Nno, I don't think so."

"Don't worry about it, then." Desmond gave him a quick nother kiss. "Yeah, don't- don't think about anything, just relax." He leaned in and smelled Alex's neck, sucked it gently while his hands pressed lower. "Can I just kinda... rub ya down here?" he asked, stroking the jeans seam at Alex's crotch. "Does that do anything for ya?"

Alex gulped in air and thrust his pelvis forward to meet Desmond's eager fingers- _gracious- need- mismatched- mate-_

"I guess that answers that question!" Desmond started stroking more vigorously then, making swirls across the peak and running lines across the inner thighs. It made sense, really, since Alex was basically the same stuff throughout his entire body. _Maybe when he forms a cock he has more pleasure cells or whatever localized there,_ Desmond thought, _but he seems to be having plenty pleasure this way too._

"Des, ohh..." Alex honestly had about a couple dozen thoughts in his mind, despite Desmond's request that he relax and not think. "I like this- ohh..."

"Ya like it, huh? Good." Desmond kissed him again, unzipped, and let out his cock to rub it against Alex's perfect skin, surface-cool but with a pulse of heat building up. "Do ya like that?"

"F-fuuck," Alex breathed, throwing an arm around Desmond, leaving the other arm on the wall to steady himself.

Desmond noted a wetness on his fingers now. "Ooh, you're... exuding something down there. Guess that means I'm doing my job!"

"Ohh, nnn," Alex shuddered and thrust again, pelvis moving without thought, and Desmond's fingers touched him _just right_ and he let out a keen cry.

Desmond chuckled. "Okay, fuck trying to talk." He pressed his mouth on Alex's again, tracing his lips with his tongue, enjoying the perfect texture and scent and taste, a little bit metallic, a little bit meaty, a little bit salty, and much more human-y than anyone would guess. He knew this taste so well by now; it was so uniquely _Alex_ , and he never got tired of it.

Alex was basically gyrating against him at this point, all but giving Desmond a goddamn standing lap dance, loving the dual feelings of penis and fingers rubbing slickly across him, all over just the fucking right spots- _good- fucking- moist- share- delight-_ There was a heat gathering in his core, and his mind was a rushing whirlwind of electric impulses. "Mmm," he groaned loudly, needily, into the kiss.

Desmond stopped for a second. "Y- you okay?"

" **More** ," Alex said, and pulled him close again. A few tendrils were unfurling from his abdomen, which he used now to entwine Desmond's penis and feel its sensual pulsing.

Desmond obliged his request for more by rubbing up into his crotch harder, and he was rewarded with a shaky grunt that he recognized as Alex's wordless pleasure. The tendrils stroked faster, and Desmond loved the feel of them, and his legs were getting shaky, but he continued to rock back and forth, thrusting against Alex's warmth. The tendrils weren't as solid as Alex's "usual" tendrils; they felt wispy, almost like smoke or water. It was a fascinating new type of stimulation. "Yeah, fuckin' good," he slurred, "Whatever your body's got, we'll make it work " 

After another minute of this, Alex broke out of the kiss and gasped for air, then in the next second his eyes and jaw clamped shut, body drum-tight as climax surged through him.

Desmond felt a shift beneath his fingers, the crotchal biomass suddenly trying to suck his hand inside, a million little twisting fibers tugging greedily on his fingers for a long few moments before finally relaxing. The tendrils got in on the action, too, jolting convulsively in a way that was the last straw for Desmond, who dropped his face to Alex's shoulder with a moan as he spurted up in a weak fountain over his partner's belly.

"Fuuuck," Alex said in a heavy, exhausted huff.

Desmond grunted.

Alex held an arm around him and pulled him down to sit and rest.

"Ohhh." Desmond flopped across Alex's legs. "That was somethin' new." He looked at the translucent stuff on his fingers. "So you make lube even from your outsides."

Too tired to form words, Alex made a little sound with the meaning of _Apparently so._

Desmond laughed. "God, we just fucked right in the hallway. And I was worried we wouldn't do anything special tonight!"

Alex swiped Desmond's jizz up onto his fingers and started eating it nonchalantly.

"You want a, uh, what's-it... cleany paper?"

"Nuh." Alex swallowed. "Eating it's best. Need boatloads of protein."

Desmond laughed again. "Oh you're so practical. I love you, babe."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact, this smut scene was originally going to be an earlier scene (pre-Deon-rescue) but it didn't fit the flow/characterization, so I rewrote/repurposed it


End file.
